UC-NRLF 


$B  n  7flfl 


f 


^ 

1 

LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

University  of  California. 

:\....r\A^.: G^..C^^U-v^    

Class 

• 

\ 

^ 


{, 


w 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 

in  2007  with  funding  from 

IVIicrosoft  Corporation 


http://www.archive.org/details/communisminameriOOjamerich 


YALE     JOHN     A.      PORTER      PRIZE 
FOR     1878 


Communism  in  America 


J  A  MKS 


Communism  in  America 


BY 


HENRY  AMMON  JAMES,  B.A. 


LAW    DEPARTMENT    OF    YALE    COLLEGE 


THE  YALE  JOHN  A.   PORTER  PRIZE  ESSAY 


Ach,  da  kommt  der  Meister  !  — 

Herr,  die  Noth  ist  gross  ! 
Die  ich  rief,  die  Geister, 

Werd'  ich  nun  nicht  los." 

Goethe. 


UNIVERSITY  I 


NEW  YORK 

HENRY   HOLT   AND    COMPANY 

1879. 


\\'A 


.1^ 


Copyright 

By  henry  holt  &  CO. 

1879. 


S.  W.  GREEN, 

Printer  ».nd  Elkctbotypbb, 

No.  18  Jacob  Street, 

New  York. 

TEEMS    OF   FOXJlSrDATION 


OF    THE 


JOHN  A.   PORTER  UNIVERSITY  PRIZE. 


At  a  meeting  of  the  President  and  Fellows  of  Yale 
College,  held  in  New  Haven,  March  13th,  1872,  an  offer 
was  received  from  the  Kingsley  Trust  Association,  dated 
at  New  Haven,  December  loth,  1871,  placing  at  the  dis- 
posal of  the  Corporation  of  Yale  College,  annually,  the 
sum  of  two  hundred  and  fifty  dollars,  to  constitute  a  prize 
to  be  called  the  John  A.  Porter  Prize,  and  to  be  awarded 
for  an  English  Essay,  upon  the  following  conditions, 
viz.  : — 

"  1 .  The  Prize  may  be  competed  for  by  any  member  of 
any  department  of  the  College,  pursuing  a  regular  course 
for  a  degree,  who  shall  have  been  a  member  for  at  least 
one  Academic  year  prior  to  the  time  when  the  Prize  shall 
be  awarded. 

"2.  The  Prize  shall  be  awarded  by  three  Judges,  two  to 
be  appointed  by  the  President  of  the  College,  and  one  by 
the  Trustees  of  the  Kingsley  Trust  Association  ;  such 
Judges  to  be  chosen  or  appointed  on  or  before  the  first  day 
of  the  second  Academic  term.  The  award  of  the  Prize 
shall  be  announced  on  Commencement  Day. 

"3.  Subjects  shall  be  chosen,  and  the  length  and 
character  of  the  Essays  may  be   specified    by  the   Trustees 


~>fi059 


iv  TERMS   OF  FOUNDATION. 

of  the  Kingsley  Trust  Association.  The  subject  shall  be 
publicly  announced  on  or  before  the  first  day  of  the 
second  Academic  term  of  the  present  collegiate  year,  and 
hereafter  within  the  first  two  weeks  of  the  first  Aca- 
demic term. 

"  4.  If  in  any  year,  in  the  opinion  of  the  Judges,  none  of 
the  competing  essays  be  of  sufiicient  excellence,  the  Prize 
shall  not  be  awarded. 

"  5.  Competing  essays  shall  be  transmitted  to  the  Judges 
within  one  week  after  the  opening  of  the  third  Academic 
term,  under  cover,  signed  by  a  fictitious  name,  and  accom- 
panied by  the  real  name  of  the  writer  in  a  sealed 
enclosure. 

"  6.  The  Trustees  reserve  the  right  to  retain  all  com- 
peting manuscripts,  and  the  right  of  publication  of  the 
same;  each  essay  must  therefore  be  accompanied  by  an 
assignment  of  the  right  of  copyright. 

"  7.  These  terms  and  conditions  may  at  any  time  be 
altered  by  the  Trustees  of  the  Kingsley  Trust  Associa- 
tion, with  the  consent  of  the  President  and  Fellows  of 
the  College." 

Resolved,  That  the  foregoing  offer  be  accepted  upon 
the  above-named  conditions. 

Attest, 

Franklin  B.  Dexter,  Secretary. 


Pursuant  to  the  terms  of  the  foregoing  Foun- 
dation, the  following  Judges  were  nominated  and 
appointed : — 

The  Rev.  WILLIAM  M.  BARBOUR,  D.D., 

Professor  in  Yale  College  ; 

TirE  Rev.  SAMUEL  HARRIS,  D.D.,  LL.D., 

Professor  in  Yale  College  ; 

HENRY  B.   HARRISON,  Esq.,  M.A. 

The  Judges  awarded  the  prize  to  the  essayist 
whose  paper  bore  the  signature  of  "Nabilac." 


1878. 
PRIZE    ESSAYIST: 

NABILAC, 

HENRY  AMMON  JAMES,  B.A., 

Baltimore,  Md., 

of  the  Senior  Class  in  the  Law  Department. 


OUTLIISrE. 


I.  Introductory — The  Use  of  the  Terms,   Com- 
munism, and  Socialism,  in  America,  ...         1-5 


FAOB 


II.    The  Old  Communism. 

{a).  Colonial  Communism — Massachusetts  and  Virginia,  6-8 

(6).   The  Communistic  Societies. 

(1).  The  Religious  Communities, 9-14 

(2).  The  Owen  and  Fourier  Movements 15-20 

III.  The  New  Communism  (Socialism). 

(a).  As  a  Political  Movement, 21-36 

(1).  Its  Origin,  21-23.     (2).  Its  Transportation  to 
and  Growth  in  America,  24-30.     (3).  The  So-     ' 
cialistic  Labor  Party — its  Political  Methods  and    * 
Strength,  30-36. 

(5).    The  Science  of  Socialism — its  Standpoint,    .     ,     .       36- 
(1).  A  Specimen  Socialist,  36-38.     (2).  The  Social- 
ist's Starting  Point,  38-45.  (3).  His  Logical  Posi- 
tion, 45-47.     (4).  His   Philosophical  Attitude, 
47-49. 

(c).    Its    Purposes  —  Marx  and  Lassalle  —  their   Social 

Scheme, 49-54 

id).  Its  Methods, 55-60 

(e).   Strength  and  Special  Application  in  America,      .       60-65 

IV.  The  Meaning  and  Value  of  the  New  Communism 

(Socialistic  Movement), 

(a).  Underlying  Misconceptions, 65-67 

(&).  The  Real  Difficulty  it  throws  up, 68-74 

(c).   Influence  on  Political  Economy, 74-78 

V.    Conclusion, 78-84 


The  Author  acknowledges  special  indebtedness 
to  the  following  works : 

Le  Socialisme  dans  le  Passe. —Thonisson.     (Bruxelles,  1859.) 

Communistic  Societies  in  the  United  States. — Charles  Nordhoft. 

History  of  American  Socialisms. — Noyes. 

Sur  les  Reformateurs. — Reybaud.  ^ 

Thornton  on  Labor.  > 

Arbeiter  Frage. — Lange. 

Die  Quintessenz  des  Socialismus. — Schaffle. 

Der  Socialismus  und  seine  Gonner. — Treitschke. 

Emancipationskampf  des  vierten  Standes. — Meyer. 

Histoire  de  I'lnternationale. — Villetart. 

Ferdinand  Lassalle. — Georg  Brandes. 

Pauperism  in  England. — Fawcett. 

Herr  Bastiat-Schulze  von  Delitzsch. — Ferdinand  Lassalle. 

Arbeiter  Lesebuch. — Ferdinand  Lassalle. 

History  of  the  Commune. — Vesinier. 

Les  Publications  Officielles  de  la  Commune.— Pierotti. 


OF  THE     "^^ 

UNIVERSITY 

OF 


COMMUNISM    IN    AMERICA. 


^  I  ^HE  subject  of  Communism  in  America  suggests  / 
-^  two  widely  divergent  lines  of  treatment.  The 
one,  following  a  stricter  definition  of  tlie  term, 
would  lead  into  an  examination  of  the  efforts  which 
have  been  made  in  this  country  to  form  social  organ- 
izations under  the  principle  of  a  strict  community  of 
goods.  The  other  would  apprehend  Communism  in  its  . 
unscientific,  popular  sense,  including  under  one  vague 
and  inaccurate  notion  all  organized  attacks  made  . 
by  the  dissatisfied  classes  upon  fundamental  social 
institutions.  It  is  the  difference  between  Commun- 
ism pure  and  simple,  and  the  comprehensive  Com- 
munism of  newspaper  phrase.  The  one  is  practised 
in  the  existing  communistic  societies,  rfttrd"  has  no 
^oliticaLsignifi^afte^.  The  other  expresses  the  rad- 
ical aspiration  of  the  uneasy  portions  of  the  lower 
classes  and  their  leaders,  and  reduces  itself  sooner 
or  later  to  the  Labor  Question.,  /" 

As   there  can  be  little  doubt,  assuming  that  we 


2  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

shall  before  long  learn  as  a  nation  certain  elemen- 
tary lessons  in  Political  Economy  and  the  Science 
of  Government,  which  at  present  absorb  our  na- 
tional energies,  that  the  Labor  Question  will  assume 
for  us,  as  it  has  for  England  and  for  Germany,  ur- 
gent and  threatening  proportions,  I  have  chosen 
to  take  up  my  subject  mainly  in  the  latter  sense. 
It  will  be  my  aim,  then,  to  examine,  though  it  will 
necessarily  be  inadequately,  the  nature  and  extent 
of  such  active  hostility  as  exists  in  America  to- 
ward the  institution  of  private  property;  and  to 
catch,  if  possible,  the  spirit  of  that  movement  which  is 
fondly  termed  by  its  adherents  the  Struggle  for  the 
Emancipation  of  the  Working  Classes. 
\/^  In  this  sense,  it  might  be  suggested  the  subject 
would  be  more  properly  treated  under  the  more 
comprehensive  term  Socialism,  which  leads  to  a 
further  word  concerning  these  two  expressions, 
Communism  and  Socialism,  partly  in  justification  of 
the  title  of  the  present  essay,  partly  to  avoid  sub- 
sequent confusion.  The  Socialists  themselves  dep- 
recate the  application  of  the  term  Communism  to 
their  doctrines.  While  defending  the  word  from 
the  unjust  odium  usually  attaching  to  it,  they  main- 
tain (on  what  slender  grounds  will  ai3pear  in  the 
sequel)  that  they  do  not  advocate  any  extinction  of 
the  right  of  private  property  in  the  communistic 
sense.     As   for  the   meaning  of   the  word  in  the 


THE  POPULAR  NOTION.  3 

mouth  of  popular  conservatism^  so  far  from  cover- 
ing any  definite  classification,  its  boundary-lines 
are  most  vague  and  shadowy  and  exceedingly  puz- 
zling on  nearer  examination.  Communism  is,  in 
fact,  found  to  be  a  convenient  name  for  ultra-radi- 
calism, containing  a  touch  of  condemnatory  oppro- 
brium; and  the  prevailing  notion  of  a  communist 
is  of  a  sort  of  irreconcilable,  social  Ishmaelite,  who 
would  revel  with  delight  in  anarchy  and  destruc- 
tion. There  can  be  little  doubt  that  this  invidious 
use  of  the  word,  connecting  it  inseparably  with  the 
idea  of  burning  and  plundering,  this  habit  of  con- 
founding all  social  radicals  with  persons  of  criminal 
intent,  has  acquired* extensive  prevalence,  especially 
since  the  events  of  March  and  May,  1871,  in  Paris. 
And  the  generalization  has  been  the  result  of  a 
course  of  reasoning  not  unintelligible,  while  contain- 
ing much  that  is  illogical  and  unjust.  For,  though 
the  Paris  Revolution  of  March  was  in  name,  and 
seemed  at  the  time,  essentially  j^^litical,  aiming 
only  at  the  acquisition  of  the  "  Franchises  commu- 
nales ;" '  yet,  as  subsequent  developments  have  shown, 
many  of  the  men  who  w^ere  prominent  then  as  lead- 
ers cherished  plans  of  complete   social  reconstruc- 

^  "  Paris  n'aspire  qu'^  fonder  la  Republique  et  k  conquerir  ses  Fran- 
chises comraunales,  lieureux  de  fournir  un  exemple  aux  autres  com- 
munes de  France." — Proclamation officielle,  6  Avril,  in  '^Publications  offi- 
cielles  de  la  Commune,"  redigees  par  Pierotti,  p.  128. 


4  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

tion,  and  the  influence  of  the  socialist  clubs  was 
great  and  constantly  widening.'  The  social  aspect  of 
that  revolution  has  been  the  one  to  make  the  great- 
est impression  abroad,  where  the  peculiarities  of 
French  political  institutions  are  little  understood : 
and  the  confusion  of  terms  has  aided  misconception. 
It  may  be  said,  too,  that  the  language  and  actions  of 
many  of  the  refugees  of  that  period,  residing  now 
in  America,  have  been  sufficient  to  damn  the  mem- 
ory of  a  cause  which  was  not  so  wholly  criminal  as 
its  enemies  have  stamped  it.  These  were  the  men 
who  murdered  bishops  and  generals,  and  who 
burned  Paris.  And  with  them  are  associated,  in 
the  popular  mind,  all  who  harbor  similar  social 
theories. 
H^  The  enthusiasts  of  the  labor  movement,  on  the 
other  hand,  delight  to  call  themselves  Socialists. 
Nevertheless,  if  we  can  disburden  ourselves  in  the 
beginning  of  unfair  prejudices.  Communism  will 
better  designate  the  movement  than  Socialism, 
which   is  in   itself  a    wider,  less   distinctive  term. 


^  The  strongest  official  hint  of  communist  tendencies,  I  find  in  a 
"  Manifesto  of  the  Committee  of  Twenty  of  Arrondissements  "  (quoted  by 
Vesinier,  Commune  de  Paris,  64),  at  the  end  of  a  long  list  of  purely 
political  objects,  as  follows  :  "  (The  communal  idea  implies)  constant 
and  a&siduous  researches  to  find  out  the  best  mode  of  furnishing  the 
producer  with  capital,  tools,  markets,  and  credit,  so  as  to  settle  forever 
the  question  of  wages  and  horrible  pauperism,  and  to  prevent  the  re- 
turn of  their  fatal  consequences,  sanguinary  revenge  and  civil  war." 


THE  VIROmiA   COMPANY.  5 

^^  Whatever  may  be  said  to  the  contrary,  the  plans  of 
these  reformers  look  to  a  direct,  if  partial  applica- 
tion of  the  principle  of  community  of  goods  ;  and 
whoever  examines  carefully  these  plans  will  hardly 
fail  to  be  convinced  that  the  fulfillment  of  their 
hopes  would  lead  inev^itably  to  a  much  more 
thorough  application  of  that  principle  than  the 
more  moderate  of  the  Socialists  themselves  contem- 
plate.' 

Before  approaching  the  political  agitations  of  to-  L^ 
day,  it  may  not  be  unprofitable  to  cast  a  hasty, 
general  glance  at  some  past  communistic  experi- 
ments which  are  peculiarly  American,  and  whose 
history  contains  more  or  less  that  is  interesting  and 
instructive  in  the  present  connection.  Communism  "^ 
is  sometimes  assigned  an  earlier  place  in  American 
histor}^  than  properly  belongs  to  it.  King  James  I., 
in  1606,  was  graciously  pleased  to  frame  a  code  of 
laws  for  ''  his  true  and  loyal  subjects,  certain  gentle- 
men of  London,"  who  had  undertaken  to  settle  his 
Majesty's  colony  of  Virginia  under  a  charter  for  the 

^  "  Eu  un  mot,  nous  voulions  constituer  la  communaute  de  I'instru- 
ment  de  travail  :  et  corame  rinstrument  de  travail  dans  la  langue  econo- 
mique  comprend  les  macliines,  oiitils,  capitaux  mobiliers  ou  iinmobiliers, 
nous  tendions  done  bien  positivement  ^  la  communaute  de  la  propriete 
generale  ;  notre  tlieorie  de  la  premiere  lieure  ne  se  distinguant  de  celle 
des  communistes  purs  qu'en  ce  sens  seulement,  que  liors  de  I'atelier, 
cliacun  disposait  a  sa  guise  de  son  avoir." — M.  Corbon,  quoted  'by  Vil- 
letart,  "  Histoire del' Internationale." 


COMMUNISM  m  AMERICA. 

strip  of  sea-coast  lying  between  parallels  34  and  45. 
In  this  product  of  royal  leisure  and  royal  learning 
there  is  a  provision  that  the  members  of  the  com- 
pany "  shall  trade  together  in  a  common  stock."  '  The 
inference  has  been  made  that  this  was  the  kernel  of  a 
well-planned  communistic  scheme.  But  such  an  in- 
ference seems  hasty  and  unjustified.  It  was  hardly 
that,  even  in  the  mind  of  James  himself ;  certainly 
not  in  the  minds  of  the  colonists.  The  association 
was  more  strictly  a  copartnership,  intended  to  last 
only  five  years,  a  provisional  arrangement  suggested, 
indeed  forced  upon  them  by  circumstances,  and 
would  have  occurred  to  a  duller  imagination  than 
that  of  the  "wisest  fool  in  England."  And  we 
find  that  the  division  of  property,  with  the  separa- 
tion of  private  interests,  took  place  before  the  ap-* 
pointed  time.  Similarly  with  the  community  of 
Plymouth  Bay.  The  conditions  of  agreement 
formed  at  Leyden,  in  1620,  between  the  Pilgrims 
and  "several  merchant  adventurers  toward  the 
voyage,"  provide,  in  Article  3,  that  "the  persons 
transported  and  the  adventurers  shall  continue  their 
joint  stock  and  partnership  the  space  of  seven  years, 
except  some  unexpected  impediment  do  cause  the 
whole  company  to  agree  otherwise ;  during  which 
time    all  profits    and  benefits  that    are  gotten  by 

^  See  the  instrument  in  Stith's  Virginia,  32-41,  and  Burk's  Va.,  i., 
86-92. 


THE  COMMUNITY  OF  PLYMOUTH  BAY.  7 

trade,  traffic,  trucking,  working,  or  any  other  means, 
of  any  other  person  or  persons,  shall  remain  still  in 
the  common  stock  until  the  division ; " '  and,  in  Arti- 
cle 10,  "that  all  such  persons  as  are  of  the  colony 
are  to  have  meat,  drink,  and  apparel,  and  all  provi- 
sions out  of  the  common  stock  and  goods  of  the 
said  colony." '  This  has  also  been  represented  to 
have  been  a  well-advised  plan  on  the  part  of  the 
Pilgrims  to  devote  the  New  World  to  a  communis- 
tic experiment.  The  Pilgrims,  filled  with  their  all- 
absorbing  religious  faith,  stern  and  uncompromising 
in  the  application  of  Christian  principles  to  prac- 
tical living,  and  having  in  mind  the  supposed  ex- 
ample of  the  early  Christian  community,'  wished 
to  break  once  for  all  from  the  traditions  of  a  so- 
ciety whose  natural  outcome  was  sin  and  suffering 
and  to  initiate  a  new^  order.  Such  is  the  theory. 
It  seems,  however,  to  be  without  sufficient  founda- 
tion. The  Plymouth  community,  like  that  of  Vir- 
ginia, appears  to  have  been  in  principle  a  copart- 
nership. 
'  Tl^e  agreement  with  the  Merchant  Adventur- 
ers was  simply  a  hard  bargain   driven  with  men 

^  Chrouicles  of  the  Pilgrims,  edited  by  Young,  80-84. 

2  Vide  supra.  See,  also,  Robertson's  America,  b.  9  ;  Bancroft,  i.  (161), 
123  ;  Morton's  New  Eng.  Mem.,  93  ;  Baylie's  Hist.  Mem.,  i.,  120,  158. 

2  Milman  says  :  "  Nothing  like  a  community  of  goods  ever  appears 
to  have  prevailed  in  the  Christian  community.  Mosheim  appears  to 
me  to  have  proved  this  point  conclusively." — Hist.  Chr.,  i.,  389. 


8  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

who  were  not  generous  enough  to  refrain  from  tak- 
ing some  advantage  of  the  destitution  of  the  other 
party.  The  provisions  of  the  articles  which  have 
been  quoted  were  plainly  called  for  by  the  necessi- 
ties of  the  situation.  Close  union  was  indispensa- 
ble to  carry  this  small  family  of  pioneers  through 
an  undertaking  as  fall  of  terrors  for  the  imagina- 
tion as  of  fatigues  for  the  body.  Only  three  years 
after  the  landing  at  Plymouth  what  was  commu- 
nistic in  their  plan  had  been  tested  to  their  satisfac- 
tion. The  following  is  the  homely,  telling  language 
of  the  chronicler :  "  The  month  of  April  being 
now  come,"  he  writes  of    the   year   1623,  "on  all 

hands  we  began  to  prepare  for   corn And 

because  there  was  small  hope  of  doing  good  ia  that 
common  course  of  labor  that  formerly  we  were  in  ; 
....  especially  considering  that  self-love  where- 
with every  man  in  a  measure  more  or  less  loveth 
and  preferreth  his  own  good  before  his  neighbor's, 
and  also  the  base  disposition  of  some  drones,  that, 
as  at  other  times,  so  now  especially  would  be  most 
burdensome  to  the  rest ;  it  was  therefore  thought 
best  that  every  man  should  use  the  best  diligence 
he  could  for  his  own  preservation," '  etc.  Commu- 
nity of  labor  proving  a  hindrance,  the  system  was 
changed  at  once,  and  without  regret.  Plainly 
they  had   no  cherished  communistic  scheme.     Nor 

1  Chron.  Pil.  Fathers,  pp.  346  and  347. 


OF  THE      ^ 

^N^VERsiTY 

OF 


COMMUNISriG  SOCIETIES  PROPER.  9 

is  there  further  mention  of  any  sucli  scheme  in  the 
subsequent  history  of  the  colony. 
^/J-^The  true  date  of  the  importation  of  Communism 
into  America  is  much  later  than  the  settlement  of 
Virginia  or  the  landing  of  the  Pilgrims.  The  ori- 
gins of  those  societies  whose  characteristic  feature 
is  the  practice  of  Communism,  can  be  assigned  to 
periods  of  emotional  excitement  tolerably  well  as- 
certained. vThey  fall  naturally  into  two  classes,  the 
religious  and  the  n  on -religious  or  socialistic  com- 
munities. I  All  of  them,  however  widely  separate 
in  manner  of  appearance,  or  subsequent  develop- 
ment, have  this  one  e^y  element  in  common,  that 
they  are  all  alike  expressions  of  revolt  against  ever- 
present,  hardfelt  evils,  blind  efforts  to  escape  the  in- 
evitably burdensome  in  human  life.  i-r]]__,-^----" — ' 

Charles  Nordhoff,  who  made  a  tour  of  the  com- 
munistic societies  in  the  United  States  in  1874, 
reported  eight  only  of  sufficient  importance  to  be 
taken  into  consideration  for  purposes  of  study  and 
comparison.  These  eight  societies  have  altogether 
seventy-two  communes.  He  estimates  their  aggre- 
o-ate  wealth  at  twelve  millions  of  dollars ;  number 
of  members,  about  five  thousand,  holding  from  one 
hundred  and  fifty  thousand  to  one  hundred  and 
eighty  thousand  acres  of  land.  VAmong  them  the 
Shakers  are  the  oldest-established  (having  existed 
since  1782),  and  occupy  a  position  of  overwhelming 


10  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

pre-eminence,  both  as  to  wealtli  and  numbers.  They 
have  a  membership  of  2415  persons,  49,335  acres 
of  land,  and  58  communes.  If  with  the  Shakers 
we  subtract  from  the  list  given  by  Nordhoff  the 
Amana  Inspirationists  in  Iowa  (population,  1450 ; 
acres,  25,000),  it  will  be  seen  to  what  uniniposing 
dimensions  the  remaining  six  dwindle. 

I  do  not  purpose  to  enter  here  into  any  lengthy 
examination  of  these  societies.  The  curiosity  with 
which  one  approaches  them  is  soon  sated,  and  finally 
overburdened  and  disgusted  with  a  weary,  weary 
story  of  trivial  details.  I  desire  only  to  point  out 
the  utter  vainness  of  all  hopes  which  look  to  them 
for  practical  help  toward  the  solution  of  perplexing 
social  questions,  and  to  show  how  groundless  are  the 
fears  of  those,  if  there  be  any  such,  who  look  upon 
them  as  a  menace  to  existing  institutions.  All  of 
these  associations,  with  one  exception,  are  essentially 
religious  rather  than  socialistic  movements.  The 
slender  legacies  of  those  periods  of  emotional  dis- 
turbance when  the  moral  atmosphere  of  the  masses 
seems  swept  with  electric  storms  of  feeling,  they 
serve  to  remind  us  of  long-forgotten  times  of  excep- 
tional religious  excitement.  And  their  sources  lie 
so  deep  in  the  hidden  corners  of  human  nature,  whose 
overflows  are  so  governed  by  incalculable  circum- 
stance, that  the  prying  eyes  which  would  spy  out 
their  secret  are  baffled.     As  religious  creeds  they 


RELIGIOUS  AND  PERSONAL  CHARACTER.  11 

possess  no  great  intellectual  interest.  They  are 
crude  excrescences  or  grotesque  distortions  of  popu- 
lar Christianity,  such  as  have  always  been  familiar 
in  the  history  of  religious  thought.  The  German 
mysticism  of  the  Rappists,  and  of  the  Aurora  and 
Bethel  Communes,  the  modern  spiritualism  of  the 
Shakers,  together  with  the  painfully  minute  cere- 
monial observances  which  mark  them  all  to  a  more 
or  less  repulsive  degree,  indicate  how  far  they  are 
separated  from  the  general  course  of  modern 
thought, 
c/^  Their  founders  were  from  the  lower  classes,  and 
usually  illiterate.  Their  following  is,  almost  with- 
out exception,  from  the  same  station  in  life — dull, 
ordinary,  uninteresting  German  and  French  peas- 
ants and  the  like.  Indeed,  of  the  societies  referred 
to  only  two  are  properly  American,  the  Shakers  and 
the  Perfectionists  (Oneida,  Wallingford),  the  re- 
mainder being  importations  more  or  less  direct 
from  Germany,  France,  Sweden,  and  Kussia.   jl^ 

Most  of  them  are  linked  with  the  fortunes  of  an 
individual.  The  society  at  Harmony,  since  the 
death  of  its  founder,  George  Eapp,  has  been  confes- 
sedly aj>proaching  with  slow  steps  its  final  disap- 
pearance. It  is  improbable  that  the  Aurora  and 
Bethel  Communes  will  long  outlive  the  directing 
influence  of  Dr.  Keil.  And  I  have  been  assured  by 
those  who  have  had  a  nearer  acquaintance  with  the 


12  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

Oneida  and  Wallingford  communities  than  is  al- 
lowed a  newspaper  reporter,  that  only  the  predomi- 
nating personal  authority  of  Mr.  Noyes  can  hold  his 
flock  together  in  the  peculiar  discipline  in  which  he 
has  trained  it ;  an  opinion  rendered  the  more  plausi- 
ble by  what  we  already  know  of  the  difficulties  at- 
tending succession.  The  Shakers  form  an  exception 
to  this  rule  of  dependence  upon  an  individual. 
f  These  associations  are  not  growing.  They  display 
no  active  propagandist  spirit.  On  the  contrary,  one 
is  struck,  in  reading,  with  their  apparent  indifference 
to  the  chances  of  extension  and  perpetuation.  All 
of  them,  except  perhaps  the  Oneida  community, 
have  seen  the  period  of  their  greatest  prosperity. 
They  seem  to  have  expanded  temporarily  at  times 
of  unusual  religious  excitement.^  The  years  between 
1820  and  1825,  and  those  between  1840  and  1846 
appear  to  have  been  marked  by  large  accessions  of 
members.  In  1823,  Mount  Lebanon,  N.  Y.,  the 
largest  of  the  Shaker  communities,  and  a  fair  exam- 
ple of  all,  had  between  five  and  six  hundred  mem- 
bers, whereas  the  number  had  fallen  in  1874  to 
three  hundred  and  eighty-three. 

The  suggestion  which  has'  sometimes  been  made, 
that  these  societies  offer  a  practical  refuge  for  the 
dissatisfied  and  superfluous  working  population,  is 
hardly  worthy  of  consideration.  Most  of  them  re- 
semble close,  thrifty,  business  corporations,  devoted 


NOT  ADAPTED  FOR   GENERAL  IMITATION.         13 

to  amculture  or  manufacture.  So  far  from  beino^ 
animated  by  any  strong  missionary  spirit,  the  more 
prosperous  ones  are  rather  jealous  of  the  admission 
of  needy  strangers.  The  Perfectionists  are  said  to 
be  "unwilling  to  receive  new  members."  Nor 
should  these  communities  be  looked  upon  as  living 
models  encouraging  imitation.  They  are  eccentrici- 
ties in  the  fullest  sense ;  spontaneous,  exceptional 
outgrowths  rather  than  artificial  creations.  No  nor- 
mal un embittered  mind,  with  strong,  healthy  aspira- 
tions, can  contemplate  their  course  of  life  without  a 
feeling  of  strong  repugnance.  Whether  it  be  spiritu- 
alism and  celibacy  among  the  Shakers,  or  the  curious 
public  inquisition  called  '^criticism"  and  the  scien- 
tific regulation  of  sexual  intercourse  among  the 
Perfectionists,  they  are  all  alike  linked  too  insep- 
arably with  religious  oddity  and  unlovely  supersti- 
tion ;  they  all  alike  go  too  far  in  denying  the  most 
fundamental  impulses  and  longings  of  human  nature 
to  be  phenomena  of  much  practical  importance  in 
the  study  of  social  science.  While  individuality  is 
lost  in  them  in  the  machine-like  evenness  of  routine, 
intellectual  littleness  leads  into  the  eternal  elabora- 
tion of  rule  and  ceremonial.  "  Not  a  single  action 
of  life,"  says  Elkins,  speaking  of  the  Shakers, 
"  whether  spiritual  or  temporal,  from  the  initiative 
of  confession,  or  cleansing  the  habitation  of  Christ, 
to  that  of  dressing  the  right  side  first,  stepping  first 


14  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

with  the  right  foot  as  you  ascend  a  flight  of  stairs, 
folding  the  hands  with  the  right-hand  thumb  and 
fingers  above  those  of  the  left,  kneeling  and  rising 
again  with  the  right  leg  first,  and  harnessing  first 
the  right-hand  beast,  but  that  has  a  rule  for  its  per- 
fect and  strict  performance."  ' 

These  religious  communities  are  indeed  no  more 
than  curious,  isolated  patterns  in  the  checkered 
mosaic  of  modern  civilization.  Their  existence  is 
made  possible  only  by  the  existence  of  the  world 
about  them.  Like  little  helpless  whirlpools  that 
eddy  and  toss  in  forgotten  nooks  by  the  shores  of  a 
rushing  river,  they  only  indicate  the  nearness  of  the 
mighty  current. 

In  the  reference  to  the  religious  character  of  the 
existing  communistic  societies  one  was  specially 
excepted.  Far  off,  in  a  distant  corner  of  Iowa,  a 
little  band  of  French  peasants  is  still  struggling  to 
realize  the  social  schemes  of  the  dreamer  Cabet. 
Through  poverty,  debt,  discouragement,  they  have 
struggled  with  an  enthusiastic  resoluteness  akin  to 
fanaticism.  They  call  themselves  Icarians,  and 
their  mention  leads  us  to  the  consideration  of  the 
communistic  movements  of  which  they  are  the 
remnant. 

*  Hervey  Elkins,  Fifteen  Years  in  the  Senior  Order  of  the   Shakers. 
Hanover,  N  H.,  1850. 


ROBERT  OWEN.  15 

Apart  from  the  religious  communities  wliicli  liave 
been  considered,  and  quite  distinct  from  them  in 
spirit,  were  the  associations  which  derived  their 
inspiration  from  Owen  and  Fourier.  ^^These  were 
purely  socialistic,  formed  to  carry  into  practice  the 
designs  of  avowed  social  reformers.  They  divide 
themselves  naturally  into  two  groups,  referred  to 
two  distinct  periods  of  time  about  twenty  years 
asunder.  Robert  Owen  came  to  this  country  in  1824. 
The  success  of  his  experiment  at  New  Lanark,  and 
the  report  of  his  great  wealth,  as  well  as  the  pure 
philanthropy  of  his  motives,  had  already  given  him 
a  reputation  which  removed  him  from  the  ordinary 
catalogue  of  social  dreamers.  Well  received  by 
prominent  members  of  the  Government,  as  well  as 
by  numerous  philanthropic  individuals,  his  views 
gained  a  speedy  and  wide  dissemination,  and  abun- 
dant and  enthusiastic  aid  was  proffered  him  from  all 
sides  in  furtherance  of  his  experiment.  Besides,  the 
man  who  advertised  comfort  and  plenty  without 
cost,  naturally  did  not  want  for  applicants.  But 
the  story  of  his  colony  at  New  Harmony,  its  bril- 
liant opening,  its  pitiable  failure,  is  the  old  story  of 
an  exalted  enthusiasm  struggling  with  the  sluggish 
and  commonplace.  In  such  contests  the  victory  in 
the  end  is  too  often  with  the  inert  mass. 

Noyes  gives  a  list  of  eleven  experiments  made 
under  the  influence  of   the  Owen  excitement,  none 


16  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

of  which  endured  more  than  three  years.  Owen 
and  his  movement  are  important  now  only  in  the 
story  of  social  curiosities.;  The  little  society  which 
he  had  formed  among  the  factory  hands  at  Lanark, 
strongly  dominated  by  his  personal  influence,  and 
which  he  had  fondly  imagined  to  be  a  microcosm 
fruitful  of  great  results,  proved  to  be  no  rule  for  the 
great  world  ;  and  that  "  doctrine  of  circumstances  " 
which  seized  him  with  all  the  force  and  flattered 
him  with  all  the  sweetness  of  originality,  whose 
truth  brought  home  to  men  was  to  revolutionize 
thought  and  reform  the  w^orld,  fell  flat  and  fruitless 
upon  ears  that  felt  none  of  the  mystic  exaltation  of 
inspiration. 

The  Fourieristic  movement,  which  followed  the 
Owen  excitement  after  a  lapse  of  some  twenty  years, 
was  more  extended  and  more  avowedly  hostile  to 
existing  social  institutions.  Many  of  those  who  had 
good-naturedly  assisted  in  the  attempted  realization 
of  Owen's  plans,  felt  only  that  they  were  aiding  in 
a  charitable  effort  to  establish  homes  for  the  desti- 
tute, dissatisfied  classes,  and  did  not  pretend  to  be 
applying  a  lever  which  should,  in  the  fullness  of 
time,  overturn  the  great  boulder  of  private  property 
obstructing  the  path  of  progress.  Fourierisni,  on 
the  other  hand'' records  itself  as  perhaps,  until  the 
modern  labor  movement,  the  most  direct  and  best- 
sustained  attack  that  has  been  made  upon  the  pres- 


FOURIERISM.  17 

ent  social  order.     Fourier  himself  belongs  to  that 
band   of    dreamers,   be    they   philosophers,    poets, 
statesmen,  or  merely  sensitive  natures  pricked  into 
an  agony  of  enthusiasm  by  the  sight  of  wrong  and 
suffering,  who  have  amused  their  leisure,  delighted 
their  poetic  sense,  fed  their  hunger  for  some  more 
perfect  justice,  or  labored  with  the  true  zeal  of  the 
reformer  in  striving  to  depict  an  ideal  state  of  soci- 
ety where  all  the  virtues  should  reign  and  all  the 
vices  be  banished.     A  large  part  of  their  inspiration 
seems  to  have  been  handed  down  in  a  sort  of  apos 
tolic  succession  from  Plato  on.     There   can  be  no 
doubt  that  Fourier  borrowed  much  of  his  theoretic 
system  from  Morelly  and  Campanella ;  while  many 
of  the  features  of  his  Phalansteres  show  an  evident 
study  of   the  Households  of  the  Hernhuters,  that 
remnant  of  the  followers  of  Huss  who  established 
themselves  in  Bohemia,  on  the  borders  of  Silesia  and 
Moravia,  about  the  middle  of  the  fifteenth  century. 
It  is  difficult  for  us  now  to  realize  either  the  wild 
hopes  or  the  bitter  fear  and  aversion  which  Fourier's 
writings  at  one  time  aroused.     To  a  reader  of  to-day 
the  description  of  his  Phalanx,  with   its  dizzying 
elaboration  of  detail,  is  at  first  entertaining,    soon 
tiresome,  and  always  more  or  less  absurd.      Hard 
above  all  is  it  to  understand  how  the  name  of  such 
a  harmless  dreamer  could  have  been  so  heaped  with 
obloquy  by  the  respectable  conservative  classes. 


18  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

His  motives  were  high.  He  at  least  assailed  real 
evils,  if  he  offered  no  sure  relief.  And  considerable 
interest  must  alv^ays  attach  to  the  name  of  a  man 
whose  schemes  could  attract  the  attention  and  the 
hopes  of  so  earnest  and  conscientious   a  student  of 

cial  conditions  as  John  Stuart  Mill. 

,  In  1842  Albert  Brisbane  constituted  himself  the 
apostle  of  Fourierism  in  America.  He  first  pur- 
chased a  weekly  column  in  the  Tribune^  in  which 
translations  of  Fourier's  writings  were  produced 
from  time  to  time^ 

The  venture  proving  a  success,  the  weekly  col- 
umn soon  became  a  daily  one.  Horace  Greeley 
himself  became  interested  in  the  movement.  The 
seeds  of  the  new  philosophy  seemed  io  fall  upon 
ground  ready  ploughed  to  receive  it.  ^\lt  is  a  sug- 
gestive fact  that  both  the  Ow^en  and  the  Fourier 
movements,  like  the  communistic  agitation  of  to- 
day, followed  not  long  after  periods  of  commercial 
disaster,  when  a  profound  dissatisfaction  with  all 
surrounding  facts  would  still  be  lingering  in  the 
minds  of  actual  sufferers.  Whatever  be  the  ex. 
planation  of  the  condition  of  the  public  mind, 
the  ideas  of  Fourier  spread  like  an  epidemic. 
Many  devout  enthusiasts  looked  to  the  new  revela- 
tion for  a  final  solution  of  the  great  problem — how 
to  make  all  men  happy.  Associations  were  quickly 
formed  in  all  parts  of  the  North  and  West  to  put 


ITS  FAILURE,  19 

in  practice  the  details  of  Fourier's  scheme.     Noyes 
gives  a  list  of  no  less  than  thirty-four  societies  as- 
signable  to  the    Fourier  epoch.  '  The  plan  of   the 
present  essay  does  not  lead  me  into  more  than  a 
mention  of  these  efforts,  and  an  indication  of  their 
results. 
X.    Few  of  them   held  out   more  than  four  or  five 
years.^  '  Most  of  them  perished  in  a  shorter  time.  V 
The  only  one  now  left  is  the  little  band  of  Ica- 
rians  in  Iowa.     The  rest  all  shattered  on  the  rock 
of  individual  selfishness.    Their  story  may  be  amus- 
ing or  saddening,  according   to   the   mood  of  the 
reader.      There   is  the  same  endless   repetition  of 
hopes  broken,  illusions  scattered  ;   disagreeable  act- 
ualities which  no  imagination  could  poetize ;  shift- 
less management,  personal  discomfort,   discontent, 
suspicion,  disagreement,  a  painful  exhibition  of  the 
small,  unlovely  qualities  of  human  nature,  all  result- 
ing in  the  inevitable  triumph  of  commonplace  cir- 
cumstance over  ill-guided  zeal. 

So  lost  and  gone  are  these  experiments  now,  that 
their  story  will  hardly  be  read,  save  by  him  whom 
curious  studies  lead  into  the  paths  of  forgotten  lit- 
erature. Only  one  has  a  familiar  sound ;  and 
Brook  Farm  owes  all  its  interest  to  association  with 
the  names  of  Channing,  Hawthorne,  Curtis,  and 
Margaret  Fuller.  But  the  brilliant  inception  of 
Brook  Farm  seemed  to  insure  it  only  a  more  bril- 


4^ 


20  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

liant  failure.  And  it  is  significant,  that  of  all  the 
literary  men  whose  youthful  enthusiasm  shared  in 
the  undertaking,  not  one  has  seen  fit  to  constitute 
himself  its  historian.  Hawthorne's  charming  story ' 
is  the  only  reminiscence  of  this  "Romantic  Epi- 
sode." The  few  direct  criticisms  which  he  has 
made  upon  his  life  at  Brook  Farm  are  exceedingly 
interesting,  both  because  of  their  raiity,  and  as  sug- 
gestive comments  applicable  to  this  whole  class  of 
communistic  experiments.  "  It  struck  me  as  rather 
odd,"  he  says  in  one  place,  'Hhat  one  of  the  first 
questions  raised  after  our  separation  from  the 
greedy,  struggling,  self-seeking  world,  should  relate 
to  the  possibility  of  getting  the  advantage  over  the 
outside  barbarians  in  their  own  field  of  labor.  But, 
to  own  the  truth,  I  very  soon  became  sensible  that, 
as  regarded  society  at  large,  we  stood  in  a  position 
of  new  hostility  rather  than  new  brotherhood." 
And  again :  "  No  sagacious  man  will  long  retain 
his  sagacity  if  he  live  exclusively  among  reformers 
and  progressive  people  without  periodically  re- 
turning to  the  settled  system  of  things,  to  correct 
himself  by  a  new  observation  from  that  old  stand- 
point." 

The  rise  and  decline  of  Fourierism  may  be  used 
to  mark  the  transition  from  the  old-school  Commun- 
ism to  the   new  Socialism.      The  two,  while   inti- 

'  "  Blitliedale  Romance, 


y 


OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY 

OF 


FIRST  APPEARANCE  OF  SOCIALISM.  21 

mately  related  so  far  as  concerns  their  raison  d'et/re 
and  their  ultimate  tendencies,  are  very  different  in 
spirit  and  methods,  /^he  one  was  poetic,  quasi- 
religious,  the  toy  of  enthusiasts  and  dreamers ; 
broken  to  pieces  as  soon  as  brought  into  the  rough 
field  of  practical  experiment.  The  other  is  real 
and  rude,  working  with  ugly,  actual  forces,  using 
without  scruple  the  nearest  material  longings  of 
human  nature  and  its  most  dangerous  passions. 
The  one  was  unscientific  and  disdained  political 
economy.  The  other  puts  itself  under  the  leader- 
ship of  men  who  boast  of  coming  "  equipped  with 
all  the  learning  of  the  age,"  '  and  boldly  challenges 
the  economists  to  battle  with  theii*  own  weapons.  \ 
We  pass  at  once  from  the  domain  of  mere  theory 
into  the  field  of  political  agitation. 

Recognizing  always  the  impossibility  of  fixing 
with  accuracy  the  exact  date  of  any  great  social 
phenomenon,  we  may,  for  the  sake  of  convenience,  as- 
sign the  first  public  advent  of  the  movement  we  are 
about  to  consider  to  the  revolutionary  period  of 
1848.''  The  first  French  Revolution  had  witnessed 
the  rise  of  the  bourgeoisie  and  the  overthrow  of  the 
politically  privileged  classes.  After  the  waves  of  that 

^  Expression  used  by  Lassalle  of  himself  :  "  Bewaffnet  mit  der  ganzen 
Bildung  des  Jahrhunderts." 

^  Voa  Sybel  has  shown  that  the  earliest  signs  of  the  proletaire  move- 
ment appeared  in  the  first  Revolution. 


22  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

"uplieaYal  had  somewliat  subsided,  expectation  set- 
tled down  witli  relief  into  a  restful  assurance  of  a  time 
of  peaceful,  progressive  development  to  come.  The 
easy,  confident  conservatism  of  the  Bourgeois  suc- 
ceeded to  the  jealous,  watchfal  conservatism  of  the 
Noble.  But  time  soon  brought  disappointment  to 
flattering  hopes.  All  the  causes  of  social  commo- 
tions had  not  yet  been  finally  removed.  A  new 
class/  glibly  baptized  the  Fonrth  Estate^ )  stej)ped 
quickly  to  the  front  with  new  demands;)  as  if  soci- 
ety having  finally  succeeded  in  throwing  off  an  out- 
grown political  husk,  new  and  nicer  questions  of 
organization  were  now  to  occupy  its  energies.  \  Be- 
fore, it  had  been  demand  for  political  equality ;  now, 
it  was  to  be  demand  for  social  equality^!  The  mid- 
dle classes  could  not  foresee  that  a  free,  constitution- 
al government,  while  it  would  not  be  able  to  lighten 
materially  the  burden  of  life  to  the  unpropertied 
classes,  Vould  awaken  in  them  a  political  conscious- 
ness which  would  give  a  tongue  to  dissatisfaction, 
and  might  become  uncomfortably  self-assertive.  The 
labor  legislation  of  the  "Government  of  '48"  is  a 
speaking  monument  to  the  first  entrance  of  a  new 
difficulty,  which  was  to  rise  up  not  only  in  France, 
but  in  the  face  of  every  free  government,  and  as 
such  it  is  heavy  with  meaning.  I  have  ventured  to  1 
dwell  the  more  at  length  upon  the  experience  of 
France,  because  of  the  foreign  parentage  of  what- 


THE  FRENCH  SOCIALISM,  23 

ever  of  active  socialism  exists  in  America,  and  the 
necessity  of  bearing  in  mind  the  general  circum- 
stances of  its  birth  in  order  to  understand  and  esti- 
mate it.  If  we  hesitate  to  give '  France  the  title 
*'  Mother  of  Freedom,"  we  may  at  least,  with  less 
flattery  and  more  truth,  call  her  the  mother  of  po- 
litical agitation.  It  was  from  the  other  side  of  the 
Rhine  that  the  impulse  came  which  first  set  the 
German  theorists  actively  to  work.  The  conditions 
in  Germany  were  favorable  enough.  It  is  true  the 
pupils,  especially  considering  the  greater  obstacles 
in  their  way,  soon,  in  all  points,  surpassed  their  mas- 
ters. And  it  is  almost  wholly  from  Germany  that  Lr^ 
the  American  agitators  draw  their  immediate  inspi- 
ration. Of  course  in  America,  too,  the  heap  of  in- 
flammable material  was  ready,  waiting  if  perchance 
the  torch  of  socialism  might  kindle  it  into  a  flame. 

,^'Wide  inequalities  of  wealth,  pauperism,  overcrowded 
centres  of  population,  protracted  periods  of  suffer- 
ing, induced  by  commercial  disasters,  all  brought 
with  them  their  usual  attendant  strains  upon  the 
social  framework. ,  The  unhappy  antagonism  be- 
tween labor  and  capital  was  becoming  well  marked. 
And  organizations  of  labor  followed  eventually, 
though  later  and  more  sluggishly,  in  imitation  of 
the  trades-unions  which  developed  so  rapidly  in  Eng- 
land after  their  legalization  in  1824. 

(^     This  was  the  field  for  socialism.     How  socialism 


^4  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

has  entered  it,  how  it  is  working  there,  with  what 
spirit,  purposes,  and  with  what  success,  it  will  now 
be  my  endeavor  to  examine. 

\^  [The  advent  of  socialism  to  our  shores  is  not  def- 
initely assignable  in  time.  It  has  dribbled  in  upon 
us._^  Many  of  the  refugees  of  the  troubled  times  of 
'48  doubtless  brought  with  them  their  untested  vis- 
ions of  the  workingman's  paradise,  with  the  bril- 
liant, though  cheap  promises  of  Proudhon  and  Louis 
Blanc.  Still  more  fervent  spirits  followed,  after  the 
suppression  of  the  Commune  in  1871.  There  still 
exists  in  New  York  a  "Societe  des  Eefugies  de  la 
Commune,"  of  whose  presence  the  reader  of  the 
newspapers  is  reminded  at  yearly  intervals  on  the 
occasion  of  their  annual  banquet  to'  celebrate  the 
Proclamation  of  the  Commune.  At  their  reunions 
they  are  accustomed  to  indulge  in  language  of  the 
most  extravagant  kind  known  to  irresponsible  impo- 
tence. They  may  occasionally  cause  a  shock  in  the 
breast  of  some  quiet  citizen  at  his  comfortable 
breakfast-table,  or  lend  a  hand  in  riotous  demonstra- 
tions, but  their  existence  is  otherv\dse  of  little  im- 
portance, as  they  have  no  particular  influence  out- 
side of  their  own  little  circle. 

/  )  In  New  York,  as  early  as  the  winter  of  1865,  not 
six  months  after  the  death  of  Lassalle,  was  formed 
a  little  society  of  Germans,  devoted  to  the  cultiva- 
tion of  the  principles  taught  by  that  great  prophet 


RECENT  INFLUENCES  FROM  EUROPE.  25 

of  socialism.  This,  however,  came  to  nothing,  and 
soon  disappeared.  Another  attempt  was  made  in 
1868  to  form  a  socialist  party  (Sociale  Partei)  under 
the  influence  of  the  Marx  school,  but  with  no 
greater  success.  These,  however,  were  all  merely 
incipient,  tentative  movements,  of  hardly  sufficient 
importance  to  catch  the  notice  of  the  daily  press. 
The  first  extensive  initiation  of  the  American  la- 
borer into  the  new  aspirations  of  the  working-classes 
of  Europe  probably  came  through  the  International. 
Though  the  International  was  not  strictly  a  com- 
munistic movement,  it  soon  developed  a  strong  com- 
munistic tendency — a  tendency  whose  increase  it 
favored,  as  is  shown  by  the  instructive  story  of  the 
progress  of  communistic  ideas  at  its  congresses.  At 
the  first  general  congress,  Geneva,  1866,  no  public 
discussion  of  the  right  of  private  property  took 
place.  The  next  year,  at  Lausanne,  there  was  a  sig-^ 
nificant  symptom  in  the  recommendation  of  the 
seizure  and  operation  of  all  railroads  by  the  state, 
though  in  general  there  was  observable  a  careful 
avoidance  of  what  was  felt  to  be  a  dangerous  sub- 
ject. At  Brussels,  in  the  following  year,  formal 
attacks  began  to  be  made  upon  the  institution  of 
private  property,  while  distinctions  were  beginning 
to  become  more  marked,  in  a  new  and  unintelligi- 
ble jargon,  between  Tnutualists^  coUectivists^  and  in- 
dividualists,. I 


26  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

In  the  last  congress  at  B41e,  tlie  question  of  abol- 
ishing the  right  to  the  inheritance  of  property 
(I'heritage)  received  thirty-two  votes  in  its  favor, 
while  there  were  twenty-three  against  it,  and  seven- 
teen abstained.  The  views  of  Marx  and  his  school 
were  rapidly  gaining  the  ascendant.' 

The  International  found  an  organization  ready  at 
hand  in  America.  The  National  Labor  Union  of 
the  United  States  was  said  to  contain,  in  18^8,  six 
hundre;^  and  forty  thousand  members  (according 
to  some  estimates  as  many  as  eight  hundred  thou- 
sand). It  had  been  formed  in  1866,  as  an  amalga- 
mation of  trades-unions,  to  concentrate  the  forces  of 
I'abor  in  array  against  capital,  and  to  "  work  for  the 
freeing  of  the  workingman  from  the  slavery  of  the 
wage-system."  In  1869,  Cameron  appeared  at  Bale 
as  representative  of  this  body,  and  a  junction  was 
foionally   effected.  ^' iThe    International    system   ot 

*  In  a  publication  by  a  "  Frencli  .Positivist"  (London,  1871),  called 
"Political  Notes  on  the  Present  Situation  in  France,"  the  author  thus 
sums  up  the  International  :  "  Their  philosophy  is  atheism,  materialism, 
the  negation  of  all  religion  ;  their  political  programme  is  absolute  indi- 
vidual liberty,  secured  by  the  suppression  of  all  government,  and  the 
division  of  nationalities  into  communes  more  or  less  federative.  Their 
political  economy  consists  essentially  in  the  dispossession,  with  compen- 
sation, of  capitalists,  and  the  transfer  of  their  funds,  of  the  instruments 
of  labor,  and  of  the  land  to  associations  of  working-men.  Their  theory 
of  history  is  that  the  nobility  and  bourgeoisie  have  had  their  time,  and 
now  that  of  the  proletariat  is  come.  They  exclude  from  society  all  that 
which  is  outside  of  the  working-class." 


GROWTH  OF  DISCONTENT.  27 

organization  was  introduced  into  America,  and  an 
active  propagandist  agitation  begun.  The  ordina- 
ry instruments  of  agitation  were  used — speeches  ap- 
pealing to  the  workingmen,  cheap  newspapers,  and 
numerous  tracts  chiefly  from  German  and  French 
sources.  The  American  workman  received  his  first 
lesson  in  the  principles  of  the  new,  enlightened 
communism.  It  was  from  this  period  that  the  ideas 
of  Marx  and  Lassalle  began  to  obtain  in  this 
country  a  wider  currency,  through  direct  importa- 
tion of  their  pamphlets,  popular  translations  and 
genial  interpretations  by  sympathetic  followers. 

With  the  dissipation  of  the  International  and  its 
terrors  for  the  anxious  conservatism  of  Europe,  the 
organization  in  America  too  faded  and  almost 
entirely  disappeared.  Not  that  the  cause  of  the 
trouble  and  all  occasion  for  further  anxiety  had 
been  removed.  The  same  difficulties  were  to  appear 
in  another  and  more  outspoken  form.  Yet,  while 
in  the  succeeding  years  the  socialist  movement  was 
solidifying  and  slowly  gaining  in  strength  in  Ger- 
many under  the  leadership  of  such  men  as  Bebel, 
Liebknecht,  and  Hasenclever,  until  its  principles 
had  been  incorporated  into  a  recognized  political 
party,  and  "  das  rothe  Gespenst "  had  taken  its  place 
in  the  Eeichstag  as  an  orthodox  and  apparently  per- 
manent bugbear,  the  cause  of  socialism,  strange  to 
say,  seemed  to  languish  in  republican,  democratic 


28  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

America,  wli ether  because  of  the  absence  of  such 
constant,  available  irritants  as  a  king  and  a  class 
aristocracy,  and  a  consequent  inadequacy  of  persecu- 
tion, or  that  the  conditions  here  were  more  favorable 
to  the  spread  of  happy  content,  or  from  all  these 
and  other  causes  difficult  of  classification.  But  the 
seeds  v^hich  had  been  planted  in  America  were  ger- 
minating in  secret,  as  was  soon  to  appear.  The 
commercial  reaction  of  1873  brought  suffering  and 
discontent.,  Expectation  watched  from  year  to  year 
with  growing  weariness  and  lessening  patience  for 
the  termination  of  a  period  of  distress  which  had  at 
first  been  accepted  with  some  popular  resignation  as 
an  inevitable  cyclic  disturbance.  The  insinuating 
voice  of  socialism,  preaching  that  all  these  troubles 
could  never  be  removed  until  a  radical  change 
should  be  effected  in  the  constitution  of  society, 
found  in  such  a  time  more  heedful  listeners. 
^  Signs  of  uneasiness  among  the  classes  most  affect- 
ed by  the  general  suffering  began  to  be  visible. 
Attempts  were  made  to  reorganize  the  International. 
IThe  incident  of  Tompkins  Square,  carelessly  dis- 
missed from  most  minds  as  an  event  quite  to  be 
expected  in  a  populous,  cosmopolitan  city  suffering 
from  the  effects  of  commercial  stagnation,  was 
elevated  into  historical  importance  by  the  socialists 
as  the  "first  collision  between  the  bourgeois  police 
and  the  newly-discovered  American   proletariat."' 

1  Volksstaat,  June  3,  1874. 


^ 


THE  BI0T8  OF  1877.  29 

Then  came  the  riots  of  the  summer  of  1877.  The 
sudden  disclosure  of  so  much  inflammable  material 
caused  sober  men  of  no  alarmist  tendencies  to  pause 
and  consider  possibilities  before  unthought  of.  This 
plundering,  burning  hatred  of  the  rich  fitted  exactly 
into  the  popular  notion  of  communism.  The  rapid 
spread  of  the  infection,  the  mad  fervor  of  the  mob, 
offered  an  alarming  glimpse  of  the  possibilities  of 
disorder  in  this  country,  while  the  spectacle  of  small 
groups  of  men  seizing  the  opportunity  to  drive  in 
and  organize  these  wild  forces  under  the  banner  of 
radicalism,  bore  an  unpleasant  resemblance  to  some 
of  the  methods  of  past  revolutions  in  France.  The 
prompt  and  effective  energy  of  the  forces  of  law  and 
order,  however,  did  much  to  reassure  the  public^ 
and  to  enable  it  in  a  surprisingly  short  time  to  dis- 
miss from  mind  a  disagreeable  and  perhaps  not 
too  significant  episode.  And  this  light-hearted  for- 
getfulness  seems  to  have  been  justified  by  the  easy 
settling  down  of  things  into  their  old  grooves. 
/Nevertheless,  the  riots  of  the  summer  of  1877  will 
always  have  a  most  important  bearing  upon  the  his- 
tory of  the  progress  of  communism  in  the  United 
States.  Beside  the  inevitable  spread  of  radical 
teaching  incident  to  such  a  period  of  fermentation, 
they  had  the  direct  effect  of  consolidating  the  social- 
istic elements,  forcing  a  more  distinct  declaration  of 
principles,  and  of  bringing  them  into  the  political 


30  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

arena  as  a  separate  voting  force,  actively  agitating 
for  extension.  As  late  as  July,  1876,  at  the  "  Union 
Congress  of  the  Workingmen's  Party  of  the  United 
States,"  it  had  been  voted  that  the  workingraen 

'  should  "  abstain  from  all  political  movement  for  the 
present  and  turn  their  backs  on  the  ballot-box,"  in 

^  order  to  spare  themselves  "  bitter  disappointment."  ' 
The  trades-unions  had  alv^ays  expressly  disavowed 
any  tendencies  of  a  political  character.  But  the 
disturbances  of  this  summer  awakened  in  the  prole- 
tariat (to  make  an  ordinary  though  not  strictly  ac- 
curate use  of  the  word)  a  sense,  indeed  an  overween- 
ing sense,  of  its  own  strength.  Those  disturbances, 
as  is  well  known,  were  followed  at  the  next  ensuing 
elections  by  extensive  nominations  of  workingmen's 
candidates,  and  numberless  extravagant  speeches  in 
which  all  sorts  of  unthinking  threats  and  promises 
were  made,  and  all  sorts  of  wild  schemes  advanced. 
\  A  congress  of  the  workingmen's  party  of  the 
United  States  was  held  at  Newark,  in  January,  1878. 
At  this  meeting  the  direction  of  affairs  fell  more 

^  than  ever  into  the  hands  of  the  avowed  socialists, 
whose  plans  did  not  stop  short  at  trades-unions,  and 
agitation  to  raise  wages  and  reduce  the  hours  of 
labor.  Instead  of  the  former  title,  the  organization 
was  now  to  be  called  "  The  Socialistic  Labor  Party," 

^  See  "  Proceedings,"  etc.,  published  by  the  Social  Democratic  Print- 
ing Association,  New  York. 


THE  SOCIALISTIC  LABOR  PARTY.  31 

a  significant  change.  As  this  party  is  at  once  the 
expression  and  the  depository  of  such  communistic 
tendencies  in  America  as  are  sufficiently  important 
to  deserve  serious  consideration,  I  shall  attempt 
here  to  give  some  notion  of  its  workings.  Ephem- 
eral associations  spring  up  from  time  to  time  ex- 
pressive of  radical  tendencies  more  or  less  hostile  to 
existing  social  institutions ;.  but  this^  one  contain^c 
the  men  who  aie  working  with  a  well-defined  pur- 
pose, which  is  the  overthrow  of  the  present  system 
of  production  on  the  basis  of  private  capital,  and 
whose  labors  atre  cast  in  a  tolerably  well-advised, 
consistent  plan.  They  are  striving  continually  to 
marshal  under  their  banner  all  available  material. 
And  however  ready  they  might  be  upon  occasion  to 
make  use  of  the  mob,  they  recognize  fully  the  fact 
that  their  only  hope  of  ultimate  success  lies  in  the 
conversion  of  the  steady,  working  classes  to  the 
cause.  Toward  this  end,  accordingly,  all  their  efforts 
are  bent ;  and  the  methods  employed  are  simple  and 
to  the  point  JA  regularly  organized  system  of  agi- 
tation obtains  under  the  direction  of  a  central, 
executive  committee  whose  seat  appears  to  be  at 
Chicago.y  Certain  leaders  of  the  movement,  known 
in  the  language  of  their  class  as  "agitators,"  who 
by  reason  of  their  personal  influence  and  oratorical 
ability  are  specially  fitted  for  the  work,  make  reg- 
ular tours  of  the  principal  cities  and  manfacturing 


32  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

towns,  haranguing  the  workingmen  in  public  and 
interviewing  individuals  personally.  Wherever  they 
succeed  in  interesting  a  sufficient  number,  they  leave 
behind  them  loose  organizations  under  the  leader- 
ship of  a  secretary,  whose  duty  it  is  to  keep  alive 
the  connection  with  the  other  branches  of  the  party. 
These  local  organizations  are  called  "Sections." 
They  usually  have  a  place  of  meeting,  where  the 
members,  and  any  others  who  may  desire,  come  to- 
gether weekly  for  purposes  of  general  discussion  and 
to  listen  to  addresses. 

They  are  the  nurseries,  the  training  schools  of 
socialism.  Through  them  the  devotees  of  the  move- 
ment strive  to  inoculate  the  laboring  classes  with 
the  spirit  of  their  own  faith,  working  with  a  patient 
zeal  of  which  the  outside  world  has  little  suspicion. 
\The  agitators  make  the  large  manufacturing 
centres  their  principal  points  of  attack.  A  promi- 
nent agitator  once  gave  me  an  interesting  account 
of  his  experience  with  the  Amoskeag  Manufactur- 
ing Company  of  New  Hampshire,  a  corporation 
which  at  one  time  employed  as  many  as  seven  thou- 
sand hands.  When  he  first  approached  the  village 
of  the  company  he  was  confounded  with  the  emis- 
saries of  the  trades-unions  and  warned  off  by  the 
authorities.  His  second  trial  was  more  successful. 
It  having  become  known  that  he  had  no  connection 
with  the  unions,  but  on  the  other  hand  preached 


"SECTIONS."  33 

strongly  the  inadvisability  of  strikes,  his  entrance 
was  in  every  way  encouraged,' the  courtesies  of  the 
village  were  extended  to  him,  and  the  public  hall 
was  opened  for  his  use.  In  his  public  address  then 
he  carefully  avoided  all  violent  or  revolutionary 
language,  striving  at  the  same  time  to  interest  the 
men  in  his  promises.  At  the  end  of  his  speech  he 
requested  such  of  the  men  as  wished  to  learn 
further  of  his  party  and  its  plans  to  meet  him  at  an 
appointed  place.  Those  who  met  him  in  pursuance 
of  this  invitation  were  initiated  more  fully  into  the 
purposes  of  socialism  and  encouraged  to  form  them- 
selves into  a  section. 

He  complained  however  that  within  the  precincts 
of  these  powerful  manufacturing  corporations  the 
men  were  so  thoroughly  dominated  by  fear  of  the 
"bosses''  that,  though  often  interested,  they  hesi- 
tated to  enter  into  any  formal  association ;  and  that 
the  better  paid  workmen,  even  where  they  were  by 
no  means  satisfied  with  their  condition,  yet  evinced 
a  disposition  to  treat  his  promises  with  some  suspi- 
cion and  cynicism.  During  the  summer  and  winter 
just  past,  sections  were  formed  in  more  than  fifty 
different  cities  throughout  the  country.  By  far  the 
larger  number  of  these,  as  well  as  the  more  flourish- 
ing, are  German.  Their  strength  is  mainly  in  the 
West.  In  the  eastern  cities  the  English-speaking 
sections  seem  to  have  great  difficulty  in  keeping  up 


34  COMMUNISM  m  AMERICA. 

an  existence.  I  found  in  January  that  the  English- 
speaking  section  in  Baltimore  had  ceased  to  hold  its 
weekly  meetings.  And  the  secretary  there,  an  active, 
well-appearing  man,  employed  in  a  shoe-factory, 
who  lived  with  his  wife  and  four  children  in  two 
rooms,  and  who  assured  me  that,  owing  to  stoppage 
of  work  in  the  factory,  he  had  not  for  six  weeks 
been  able  to  earn  more  than  four  dollars  a  week, 
told  me,  in  a  plaintive  description  of  the  affair  of  his 
Section,  that  he  could  not  collect  money  enough  to 
pay  for  his  correspondence.  No  Section  has  suc- 
ceeded in  Washington.  In  New  Haven  an  English- 
speaking  Section,  with  weekly  meetings,  has  been 
kept  up  with  some  vigor. 

I  have  been  an  occasional  attendant  at  these 
gatherings,  and  have  watched  with  keen  interest  the 
hard-featured  faces  turned  eagerly  to  catch  some  ray 
from  the  newly  risen,  doubtful  light  of  socialism. 
To  judge  from  the  general  appearance  of  the  men 
present,  most  of  them  seemed  to  be  from  the  class 
of  day-laborers.  Only  here  and  there  could  a  face 
be  discerned  which  a  certain  indefinable  touch  of 
intellectuality  distinguished  from  the  rest  and 
marked  as  belonging  to  a  higher  paid  workman  or 
mechanic.  They  sat  together  in  close,  impressive 
silence,  listening  with  contagious  attention  to  one 
after  another  of  their  number,  as  they  rose  and  told 
their  stories,  of  the  tyranny  of  "  bosses,"  of  the  hunger 


SOCIALISTIC  MEETIJVGS.  35 

and  suffering  of  families,  of  truitless  searches  for 
work.  It  was  not  a  wise  or  well-informed  discus- 
sion of  the  labor  question  and  of  the  proper  means 
of  alleviating  distress  ;  but  only  a  blind,  passionate 
presentation  by  each  of  the  severity  of  his  own  lot. 
Now  one  would  proclaim  with  indignation  the  name 
of  some  comrade  whom  timidity  or  venality  had 
made  a  backslider.  Now  another  would  urge  them 
in  wild,  threatening  language  to  revolt.  The  sharp- 
faced,  fierce-eyed  man  who  stood  with  right  hand 
uplifted  in  unconscious  eloquence  and  voice  ringing 
high  and  shrill  with  excitement,  as  he  announced 
that  three  fourths  of  the  voters  of  this  country  were 
workingmen,  held  in  base  subjection  by  the  rest, 
offered  in  himself  a  vivid  picture  of  that  simple 
logic  of  numbers  whose  power  with  the  masses  it 
seems  impossible  to  undermine. 

Then  again  I  have  seen  the  rough  audience,  its 
energies  already  tried  by  a  long  day  of  physical 
labor,  grow  weary  and  restless  under  the  long-sus- 
tained, high-pitched  enthusiasm  of  some  professional 
agitator,  who  maintained  a  too  persistent  tone  of 
passionate  appeal.  One  by  one  the  listeners  would 
steal  guiltily  from  the  room  with  painfully  hopeless 
efforts  to  escape  observation,  often  in  the  midst  of 
the  pointed  upbraidings  of  the  speaker,  whose  fervid 
oratory  was  suspended  for  the  moment  to  admit  a 
parenthetical  rebuke  of  the  conscious  truant  for  his 


36  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

faint-heartedness.  It  is  at  sucli  times  that  one  is  im- 
pressed with  the  hopelessness  of  the  task  of  holding 
such  men  up  to  the  constant,  patient,  intelligent  de- 
votion necessary  in  the  unequal  struggle  with  vested 
private  interests. 

Before  entering  more  fully  and  more  specifically 
into  the  actual  workings  of  this  radical  movement, 
I  wish  to  turn  attention  to  what  may  be  called  the 
science  of  socialism  as  it  is  cherished  by  the  better- 
informed  of  its  leaders  and  by  some  men  of  acknowl- 
edged learning  and  ability  in  Germany.  Some 
preliminary  introduction  will  be  necessary  to  obtain 
a  patient  hearing  and  thoughtful  consideration  of 
demands  which  most  of  us  are  in  the  habit  of  dis- 
missing with  little  ceremony. 

I  have  had  an  opportunity  of  making  the  personal 
acquaintance  of  one  of  the  leaders  in  the  socialist 
movement,  a  man  who  is  widely  influential  among 
the  workingmen  throughout  the  country,  and  whose 
name  acquired  unpleasant  notoriety  among  the 
order-loving  at  the  time  of  the  Tompkins  Square 
troubles.  No  one  could  correspond  less  than  he  to 
the  popular  notion  of  a  communist.  Small,  modest, 
inoffensive  in  appearance,  his  physique  is  as  far  from 
suggesting  brutal  force  as  his  character  is  removed 
from  violence.  He  was  apprenticed  when  quite 
young  to  the  piano-making  trade,  and  still  works  in 
a  shop.     His  interest  in  the  socialist  movement  was 


A  SOCIALIST.  37 

first  aroused  by  participation  in  the  great  eight- 
hour  strike  of  1872,  in  New  York,  when,  though 
still  very  young,  he  was  deputed  by  his  comrades  to 
meet  the  masters  in  conference,  and  was  completely 
silenced  by  the  arguments  used  by  the  latter  to 
prove  that  they  could  not  possibly,  in  the  then  state 
of  trade,  give  the  same  pay  for  less  work.  It  was 
then  that  the  meaning  of  competition  began  to  dawn 
upon  him.  While  his  sympathies  justified  the  aspi- 
rations of  his  companions  to  improve  their  condition, 
his  reason  could  not  but  admit  the  force  of  the  mas- 
ters' position.  From  that  time  he  devoted  himself 
eagerly  to  study.  He  taught  himself  German.  Un- 
fortunately his  first  intellectual  hunger  was  fed  for 
the  most  part  upon  newspapers,  and  socialist  tracts 
and  pamphlets,  which  gave  his  mind  in  the  begin- 
ning a  decided  bias.  He  now  delights  to  call  him- 
self a  positivist,  in  imitation  of  most  of  the  socialist 
leaders.  While  studying  with  great  interest  the 
curious,  ill-assorted  mass  of  half-knowledge  which 
makes  up  the  sum  of  his  intellectual  acquisitions, 
and  the  fitful,  often  confusing  ramblings  of  a  mind 
naturally  gifted  with  unusual  acumen  and  initiative 
activity,  but  lacking  all  systematic  training,  I  have 
learned  to  look  upon  his  character  with  esteem,  and 
to  recognize  in  him  a  disposition  subject  to  the 
purest  impulses  of  affection.  He  has  the  virtues 
which  go  to  make  up  a  valuable  citizen.     He  is 


38  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

steady,  industrious,  honor-loving.  He  abstains  en- 
tirely from  strong  diink,  and  does  not  even  treat 
himself  to  those  unsinful  little  indulgences  which 
are  by  common  consent  adjudged  necessary  to  make 
bearable  the  sharp  edge  of  existence.  His  personal 
moderation  might  indeed  well  be  an  example  to 
many  a  zealous  but  unsteady  pillar  of  the  existing 
order  of  things.  He  does  not  seem  to  be  discon- 
tented vdth  his  individual  lot,  or  ill-naturedly  envi- 
ous of  his  neighbors ;  and  I  have  failed  to  discover 
in  him  any  trace  of  that  self-seeking  spirit  which  is 
so  barefaced  an  element  in  the  composition  of  the 
ordinary  demagogue.  A  sensitive  nature  stirred 
into  passionate  sympathy  by  the  sight  of  the  misery 
and  degradation  of  his  class,  he  has  ardently  adopted 
a  cause  which  also  flatters  his  self-love  with  a  sense 
of  high  purpose  and  great  ends.  He  has  the  sub- 
lime, unconquerable  confidence  of  enthusiasm.  His 
faith  sees  a  never-dimmed  vision  of  success  in  the 
future.  But  it  is  with  him  as  with  almost  every 
one  who  pursues  absorbingly  one  great  end,  how- 
ever lofty  the  feeling  which  inspires  him — he  is  not 
nicely  scrupulous  about  means. 

I  have  rested  here  upon  the  character  of  this  man 
with  special  purpose.  Intercourse  with  him  has 
done  much  to  moderate  my  own  view  of  a  cause 
which  I  had  been  in  the  habit  of  regarding  with  the 
orthodox  horror  as  a  thing  wholly  unclean.      He  is 


THE  SOCIAL  BIAS.  39 

not,  to  be  sure,  a  fair  sample  of  the  ordinary  Social, 
ist.  It  would  be  safe  to  say  that  very  few  of  the 
participators  in  the  movement  are  so  high-strung. 
But  such  men  introduce  us  to  one  aspect  of  Social- 
ism which  is  often  overlooked.  For  with  all  this 
empty  noise,  this  loud  display  of  fatuitous  igno- 
rance, which  disgusts  and  repels  the  serious  observer 
at  the  outset,  there  is  mingled  a  true  voice  of  com- 
plaint, telling  a  tale  of  no  little  meaning,  and  de- 
serving at  least  thoughtful  examination  and  per- 
haps sympathy.  It  has  been  the  almost  universal 
practice  to  meet  the  dissatisfied,  questioning  work- 
ingman  with  a  bristling  array  of  economic  laws, 
driving  him  back  into  dogged  resignation,  full  of 
repressed  but  still  smoldering  fire.  There  can  be 
no  hope  of  gaining  a  profitable  understanding  of  the 
true  animus  of  modern  Socialism  unless  it  be  ap- 
proached in  a  totally  different  spirit.  The  habit 
must  be  given  up  of  simply  dismissing  with  a  sneer 
him  who  hurls  himself  at  an  economic  law  as  mad 
or  criminal. 

The  possession  of  private  property,  the  hope  of 
its  possession,  or  association  in  its  benefits,  no  less 
than  its  absolute  deprivation,  carries  with  it,  it 
should  be  remembered,  a  powerful  and  most  insid- 
ious bias.  Each  attack  arouses  a  passionate  instinct 
of  self-defense,  and  every  questioner  of  its  right  to 
existence  is  looked  upon  as  a  hateful  enemy.     He 


40  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

who  wishes  to  approach  conscientiously,  as  a  stu- 
dent, not  eagerly  as  an  opposing  advocate,  the  ques- 
tions propounded  by  Socialism,  will  be  always  sus- 
picious of  himself,  lest  his  reasoning  be  lead,  be  it 
ever  so  little,  by  interest. 

The  attainment,  too,  as  far  as  possible,  of  a  judicial 
state  of  mind,  will  be  the  best  promise  of  eifec- 
tive  contribution  toward  a  permanent  reconciliation 
between  the  wage-taker  and  the  wage-giver.  In 
order  to  value  properly  the  demands  of  the  Social- 
ist, an  effort  must  be  made  to  gain  his  stand-point. 
And  to  this  end  it  will  be  necessary  first  of  all  to 
consider  the  most  unflattering  side  of  the  existing 
social  order,  to  reflect,  not  upon  what  it  has  accom- 
plished, but  upon  w^hat  it  has  failed  to  accomplish. 
.j  This  is  the  starting-point  of  the  Socialist.  He 
sits  in  judgment  upon  the  experiment  of  society 
built  upon  the  foundation  of  private  property  and 
pronounces  it  a  failure.  He  calls  attention  to  the 
wide  inequalities  in  the  distribution  of  material  and 
intellectual  good  things.  He  points  to  the  ignorant, 
toiling  thousands,  and  then  to  the  hundreds  who 
harvest  the  products  of  their  labor.  He  looks  with 
sceptical  eye  upon  the  much-lauded  conquests  of 
civilization.  He  throws  a  doubt  upon  the  good  of 
so-called  progress.  These  things,  he  says — the  ac- 
quisitions of  science,  the  cunning  children  of  inven- 
tion, the  glorious  creations  of  art,  all  that  is  written 


THE  SOCIALIST  STABTINO-POINT  41 

in  the  proud  list — may  indeed  widen  the  circle  of 
possible  gratifications,  sharpen  sensibilities,  and  add 
keenness  to  enjoyment  for  the  few ;  but  as  for  rais- 
ing the  race,  do  not  these  same  advances  call  into 
being  additional  thousands  of  human  creatures, 
whose  plodding  task  it  is  from  birth  till  death  to 
satisfy  the  mere  conditions  of  living,  who  swell  the 
ranks  of  paupers  and  criminals,  who  at  frequent  in- 
tervals must  be  decimated  by  suffering  in  order  to 
accommodate  an  economic  readjustment?  What 
reason  have  these  to  feel  proud  and  grateful  in  the 
contemplation  of  the  wonderful  gains  of  modern 
science  ?  Is  it  for  having  created  a  reason  for  their 
existence  as  its  merely  mechanical  servitors  ? '  Is 
it  a  great  end  to  look  forward  to — the  enabling  of 
the  earth's  surface  to  support  a  larger  population  di- 
vided into  a  small  class  of  those  who  understand 
and  enter  into  the  spiritual  enjoyment  of  ever- widen- 
ing knowledge,  sharing  the  while  in  the  material 
benefits  of  each  advance ;  and  on  the  other  hand  a 
far  larger  class  of  those  whose  time  and  energies 
must  ever  be  solely  taken  up  with  benumbing  phys- 
ical labor  in  the  service  of  this  same  progress.  The 
Socialist  marshals  the  vices  and  follies  of  the  rich 

^ "  Es  ist  Thatsacbe,  dass  das  Elend  der  arbeitenden  Massen  niclit 
abgenommen  bat  wabrend  der  Periode  1848-1864.  Und  dennocb  stebt 
diese  Periode  mit  ibrem  Fortscbritt  von  Industrie  und  Handel  beispiellos 
da  in  den  Annalen  der  Gescbicbte." — Karl  Marx,  ''An  die  Arheitende 
Classe  Europas." 


42  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

side  by  side  with  the  wretchedness  and  degradation 
of  the  poor  in  eloquent  juxtaposition.  Do  not  the 
widest  differences  between  luxury  and  squalor,  he 
asks,  the  greatest  disproportion  in  number  between 
those  who  enjoy  and  those  who  want,  exist  in  the 
very  centres  where  civilization  is  most  intense.'  He 
will  lead  you  from  the  spectacle  of  all  the  studied 
appliances  of  wealth  in  a  large  city,  to  the  contem- 
plation of  its  tenement-houses,  its  hovels,  where  the 
human  working  animal  recuperates  nightly  for  the 
ever-returning  toil  of  the  morrow,  or  to  some  great 
factory  full  of  its  dull,  busy  watchers,  and  dwell 
upon  the  ever-present  crying  dualism  in  the  human 
lot. 

It  is  hard  to  deny  facts.  There  are  indeed  two 
sides  to  progress.  Few  who  have  entered  more 
closely  into  the  study  of  social  conditions  have  pre- 

'  The  following  figures  are  taken  from  the  "  Journal  of  the  Statistical 
Society,"  London,  vol.  XXXVIL,  p.  253. 
Years  ending  at 

Lady-Day.  Population  (Eng.).  Total  No.  Paupers.  Ratio. 

1866 21,100,000  916,152  43 

1867 21,320,000  931,152  4.4 

1868 21,540,000  992,640  4.6 

1869 21,760,000  1,018,140  4.7 

1870 21,980,000  1,032,800  4.7 

Professor  Schmoller,  one  of  the  most  conscientious  of  modern  investi- 
gators, says  :  "  In  Bezug  auf  die  Irren  und  die  Selbstmorder  zeigt  die 
Statistik  eine  regelmassige  Zunahme  in  den  Landern  der  intensivsten 
modernen  Cultur." — TIeber  die  HesuUate  der  Bevolkerungs  u  Moral- 
Statistik,  p.  13. 


A  DARK  SIDE.  43 

served  that  easy  optimism  with  regard  to  the  social 
order  which  belongs  to  absorption  in  immediate 
personal  occupations.  "  Hitherto  it  is  questionable," 
says  Mr.  Mill  in  a  memorable  passage,  "if  all  the 
mechanical  inventions  yet  made  have  lightened  the 
day's  toil  of  any  human  being.  They  have  enabled 
the  same  poj)ulation  to  live  the  same  life  of  drudg- 
ery and  imprisonment,  and  an  increased  number  of 
manufacturers  and  others  to  make  fortunes."  '  And 
an  eminent  German  writer  of  no  radical  tendencies 
expresses  himself  thus  strongly  at  the  prospect  of- 
fered to  labor  by  the  extension  of  the  factory  sys- 
tem :  "  It  is  well  written  over  the  gates  of  Hell, 
Lasciate  ogni  Speramctr^^Q^^j  no  one  can  deny 
that  these  conditions  are  most  pitiable.  Labor  is 
indeed  man's  lot  upon  the  earth,  and  every  mortal 
can  and  must  learn  to  submit  to  manifold  privations. 
But  if  labor  is  to  be  purely  mechanical,  eternally 
unchanging,  dulling  both  mind  and  body,  and  in 
return  for  it  only  such  wage  is  to  be  given  as  will 
barely  furnish  the  necessities  of  existence,  then  in- 
deed is  much  expected  of  human  patience  and  power 
of  renunciation." '  / 

Let  me  quote  here,  too,  a  passage  from  Mr.  Fred- 
eric Harrison,  in  which  (not  to  accuse  him  of  inten- 
tionally furthering  the  schemes  of  Marx  and  Lassalle) 

^  Political  Economy,  bk.  iv. ,  cli.  6,  sec.  3. 
2  Robert  von  Mohl,  Politik,  ii.,  518. 


44  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

he  has  put  the  socialist  complaint  in  his  inimitable 
language  with  such  force  that  it  has  become  a  fav- 
orite text  with  the  Socialists  themselves.  "A  so- 
ciety in  which  generation  after  generation  passes 
away,  consolidating  vast  and  ever-increasing  hoards 
of  wealth,  opening  to  the  wealthy  enchanted  realms 
of  idleness,  luxury,  and  waste,  laying  on  the  laborer, 
generation  after  generation,  increasing  burdens  of 
toil,  destitution,  and  despair;  a  society  in  which 
capital  has  created  a  gospel  of  its  own,  and  claims, 
for  the  good  of  society,  the  divine  right  of  selfish- 
ness, the  right  to  exert  its  powers  at  will  indefinitely 
for  the  indulgence  of  its  own  desires,  rebelling 
against  any  social  control,  and  offering  up  '  with  a 
light  heart '  the  misery  and  degradation  of  the  poor, 
as  a  sad  but  inevitable  sacrifice  on  the  altar  of  com- 
petition— such  a  society  these  workmen  of  Paris  will 
not  forever  tolerate." ' 

The  Socialist  seizes  eagerly  upon  the  fact,  which 
most  observers  and  economists  are  ready  to  admit, 
though  trustworthy  statistics  directly  to  the  point 
are  difficult  of  access,  that  in  modern  civilized  States, 
under  the  present  industrial  system,  wealth  tends  to 
accumulate  in  fewer  hands,  through  the  extinguish- 
ment of  the  man  of  moderate  means ;  that  small  en- 
terprises have  less  and  less  opportunity,  and  that, 
consequently,  the  facilities  for  the  existence  of  labor 

'  The  Re  vol.  of  the  Commune,  Fortnightly  Meview,  May  1, 1871. 


SOCIALIST  LOGIC.  45 

and  capital  combined  in  the  same  person  become 
fewer  and  fewer.  The  result  of  this  tendency,  he 
asserts,  is  to  divide  off  more  and  more  distinctly  the 
two  classes  of  wage-givers  and  wage-receivers,  and 
to  increase  the  dependence  of  the  latter. 

It  must  be  borne  in  mind  at  the  same  time  that 
the  Socialist  does  not  think  of  ascribing  the  dis- 
eases of  the  social  body  to  inherent  defects  of  human 
nature.  In  most  cases  he  will  reject  the  idea  with 
scorn.  The  perfectibility  of  human  nature  is  the 
corner-stone  of  his  faith.  To  him  all  faults  are  ex- 
plained by  a  faulty  social  organization  and  the 
abuse  of  the  right  of  private  property.  "  Le  social- 
isme,"  says  Proudhon,  "affirme  Tanomalie  de  la 
constitution  presente  de  la  societe  et  partant  de 
tous  les  etablissements  anterieurs.  II  pretend  et  il 
prouve  que  I'ordre  civilise  est  facile,  contradictoire, 
inefficace ;  qu'il  engendre  de  lui  meme  I'oppression, 
la  misere  et  la  crime :  il  accuse,  pour  ne  pas  dire  la 
calomnie,  tout  le  passe  de  la  vie  sociale  et  pousse  de 
toutes  ses  forces  k  la  refonte  des  moeurs  et  des  in- 
stitutions." '  This  fundamental  denial  enables  the 
Socialist  to  avoid  the  usual  arguments  drawn  from 
economic  laws  arising  out  of  existing  social  condi- 
tions— and  logically,  from  his  stand-point.  He  would 
change  the  conditions  themselves.  Thus  he  will 
answer  objections  based  upon  the  inevitable  effects 

^  Systeme  des  Contradictions  economiques,  1.,  4. 


46  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

of  competition  by  saying  that  competition  is,  above 
all,  tlie  evil  wliich  he  wishes  to  abolish ;  in  the  sys- 
tem he  contemplates  there  will  be  no  competition. 
The  reply  at  once  springs  to  the  lips :  but  it  is  as 
sensible  to  talk  of  abolishing  human  nature  itself  as 
to  talk  of  abolishing  competition ;  all  the  advances 
which  man  has  made  in  the  face  of  the  forces  of 
brute  and  inanimate  nature  have  been  made  by 
virtue  of  this  very  principle.  Here,  it  is  evident, 
the  point  of  attack  is  changed.  If  your  antagonist 
be  of  the  French  school  of  Socialism,  he  will  prob- 
ably be  willing  to  meet  you  upon  this  ground,  and 
assert  that  more  worthy  things  yet  might  have  been 
accomplished  had  no  such  principle  existed,  had 
men  worked  together  like  brothers,  combining  their 
forces.  But  if  he  be  of  the  more  advanced  German 
type,  he  will  shift  the  issue  to  still  another  ground, 
and  rejoin  perhaps  somewhat  as  follows :  True ! 
let  us  admit  that  all  that  has  been  accomplished 
hitherto  has  bjeen  through  competition ;  we  do  not 
mean  to  undervalue  the  past ;  we  maintain  only  that 
the  time  will  come,  nay,  is  already  come,  when,  hav- 
ing gained  the  vantage-ground  which  we  occupy,  and 
yielding  up  none  of  it,  we  may  throw  aside  the  old 
weapons  necessary  to  its  attainment  and  take  up  new 
ones  fitted  for  higher  victories ;  we  must  enter  upon 
a  new  course  of  higher  and  truer  development,  one 
which  need  not  and  shall  not  build  so  much  upon 


SCIENTIFIC  ATTITUDE.  4^ 

individual  selfishness ;  tlie  old  methods,  too  long  re- 
tained, are  already  retarding  us;  the  socialistic 
scheme  is  the  only  one  which  can  lead  all  men  alike 
to  higher  perfection. 

Thus  it  will  appear  the  diiferences  between  the 
Socialists  and  the  Economists  lie  deeper  down  than 
the  laws  of  rent,  profits,  supply  and  demand,  cost  of 
production,  and  the  like,  a  fact  the  neglect  of  which 
leads  to  much  barren  discussiorrr;)'  The  true  matter 
in  controversy  is  the  essential  constitution  of  human 
nature,  and  the  fundamental  relations  of  man  to  nat- 
ural forces.  Out  of  these  are  drawn  the  ultimate 
justification  of  economic  laws,  and  here  are  to  be 
found  the  facts  over  which  the  Socialist  stumbles. 
The  intelligent  defender  of  society  as  constructed 
upon  the  assumption  of  private  property  can  notx 
contend  that  it  is  absolutely  good,  or  even  the  best' 
imaginable,  but  only  that  it  is  the  best  practicable. 

This  suggests  the  appropriateness  of  a  word  with 
regard  to  the  attitude  of  the  new  scientific  Socialism 
toward  the  most  recent  advances  in  science  and  in 
philosophical  thinking.  The  introduction  general- 
ly of  historical  comparative  methods,  and  the  appli- 
cation of  the  theory  of  evolution  to  explain  the 
development  of  institutions,  dealt  a  mortal  blow  to 
the  whole  fabric  of  social  philosophy  built  upon  the 
"  compact  and  natural  rights  "  theory,  which  culmi- 
nated and  became  popularized  in  the  latter  half  of 


48  COMMUmSM  IN  AMERICA. 

the  eighteenth  century,  and  is  usually  and  sufficient- 
ly well  designated  by  association  with  the  name  of 
Kousseau.     While  it  is  true  that  raany  fallacies  as- 
cribable  to  a  lurking  assumption  of  the  existence  of 
natural  rights,  in  the  sense  of  the  school  of  Eousseau, 
appear  strikingly  still  in  the  writings  of  the  lead- 
ing French  Socialists — Cabet,  Proudhon,  and  Louis 
Blanc — and  still,  of  course,  taint  the  reasonings  of 
all  the  less  carefully  informed  of  the  Socialists,  the 
more  advanced  German  school,  on  the  other  hand, 
have  forsaken  the  old  stand-point,  and  boast  of  being 
abreast  with  the  latest  science.    They  reconcile  their 
position   with    the   closest    allegiance   to   Darwin. 
The  argument  has  in  part  been  already  suggested. 
Lange  takes  up  the  two  principles — the  struggle  for 
existence  and  the  survival  of  the  fittest — and  defends 
from  this  position  the  struggle  of  the  workingman 
to  change  his  condition.     If  the  working-classes  find 
their  situation  intolerable  and  hopeless,  their  ejfforts 
to  bring  a  about  social  order  in  which  their  happiness 
will  be  better  assured  are  made  but  in  fullfilment  of 
their  own  law  of  existence.     The  test  of  fitness  is 
survival.     If  the  new  order  be  the  destruction  of  the 
present  social  organization,  it  will  be  by  virtue  of 
its  own  superior  fitness.    Lange's  ingenious  use  of  the 
Darwinian  hypothesis  illustrates  well  the  manner  in 
which  the  more  advanced  Socialists  adapt  the  latest 
methods  of  thought  to  their  own  ends.     "  But,"  he 


FATHERS  OF  SOCIALISM.  49 

says,  "  as  these  advantages  are  dependent  upon  bet- 
ter nourishment,  bodily  exercise,  more  leisure,  and 
more  favorable  opportunities  for  the  development 
of  all  the  faculties,  so  it  is  just  as  certain,  on  the 
other  hand,  that  uniform  and  straining  labor,  or  the 
constant  practice  of  a  wearisome  and  difficult  man- 
ual art,  exerts  a  lasting  influence  upon  the  individ- 
ual ;  and  that  the  effects  of  this  influence  are  per- 
petuated by  inheritance,  and  thus,  by  the  union  of 
adaptation  and  transmission  by  inheritance,  gradual- 
ly types  of  working-classes  are  formed  with  ever- 
increasing  distinctness."  '  From  this  he  goes  on  to 
point  out  the  constantly  threatening  danger  that 
"the  laborers  in  the  industrial  regime,  under  the  do- 
minion of  capital,  may  sink  to  the  condition  of  a  race 
physically  and  spiritually  inferior." ' 

The  new  Socialism  begins,  then,  by  arraigning  the 
existing  social  system  ;  points  out  with  unsparing 
finger  its  shortcomings,  and,  not  content  with  being 
merely  destructive,  proceeds  to  offer  a  practical  sub- 
stitute. It  proposes  to  introduce  an  order  of  things 
in  theory  more  just  and  happier  in  effect.  As  it  is 
not  indigenous  in  America,  but  strictly  an  importa- 
tion, it  will  be  necessary  to  go  to  the  German  foun- 
tain-head in  order  to  gain  a  clear  comprehension  of 
its  methods. 

^Friedricli  Albert  Lange,  Die  Arbeiterfrage.  55,  Dritte  Auflage.  Win- 
terthur,  1875.  ^  ubi  supra. 


50  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

Marx  and  Lassalle  are  familiar  names  in  both  con- 
tinents. The  influence,  especially  of  Ferdinand  Las- 
salle, the  great  prophet  of  Socialism,  exercises  almost 
undisputed  sway  over  a  large  body  of  devout  fol- 
lowers scattered  throughout  Germany  and  America, 
whose  watchful  zeal  and  missionary  ardor  make  up 
the  main  strength  of  the  socialistic  movement.  This 
position  of  dominance  is  hardly  rivaled  even  by 
that  of  Karl  Marx.'  The  strange  terminology  of 
the  latter,  and  his  abstruse  encounters  with  the  econ- 
omists, make  the  reading  of  his  longer  treatises,  such 
as  his  famous  "  Kapital,"  a  matter  of  painfal  indus- 
try, and  remove  him  farther  from  the  appreciation  of 
the  ordinary  man.  His  objects  of  attack  and  his 
plans  for  the  future  organization  of  the  State  are,  in 
the  main,  co-ordinate  with  those  of  Lassalle ;  the 
principal  differences  between  the  two  being  in  their 
immediate  introductory  purposes.  The  features 
which  particularly  distinguish  the  Marx  movement 
are — the  emphasis  which  it  lays  upon  the  necessity 
of  international  co-operation,  uniting  in  an  interna- 
tional organization  the  efforts  of  the  workingmen  of 

^  Karl  Marx,  born  May  3,  1818,  at  Trier  ;  the  son  of  a  royal  Prussian 
Oberbergrath ;  studied  law  at  Bonn  ;  married  a  sister  of  herr  Von 
Westpbalen,  a  member  of  the  Manteuflfel  Ministry.  His  studies  led  him 
into  extreme  Socialism.  He  renounced  the  diplomatic  career,  which  was 
open  to  him,  became  a  fugitive  from  Germany  in  1849,  and  has  since 
resided  in  London.  "Das  Kapital,"  his  most  important  work,  was  pub- 
lished in  1867. 


LAS8ALLE.  51 

all  nations,  and  its  encouragement  of  strikes  and 
trades-unions.  Lassalle's  movement  was  strictly  na- 
tional. It  may  be  said,  too,  tliat  there  is  more  virus 
in  the  unscrupulous  revolutionary  spirit  of  Marx 
than  in  Lassalle's  reliance  upon  a  gradual  recon- 
struction. Since  the  union  of  the  two  sections  of 
the  Social  Democratic  Party  in  Germany,  at  Gotha, 
in  1875,  however,  the  two  schools  have  been  rapidly 
drawing  together. 

The  personality  of  Lassalle  is  an  exceedingly  in- 
teresting one.  Its  study  is  full  of  instruction  for 
the  observer  of  modern  ultra-radical  tendencies. 
The  son  of  a  wealthy  Jew  in  Breslau,  manifesting  in 
early  years  unusual  intellectual  activity,  sent  to  the 
University,  where  he  soon  gave  proofs  of  uncom- 
mon ability ;  later,  a  shining  member  of  a  brilliant 
circle  in  Berlin,  iii  which  he  was  dubbed  by  Von 
Humboldt  ^'  das  Wunderkind,"  earning  his  iirst  lau- 
rels by  the  publication  of  an  extensive  treatise  upon 
the  philosopher  Heraclitus  of  Ephesus ;  distin- 
guished for  his  personal  fastidiousness  and  the  ex 
cellence  of  his  social  entertainments,  Lassalle,  one 
would  think,  judging  from  the  circumstances  of  his 
early  life,  ought  to  have  been  an  intellectual  aristo- 
crat rather  than  a  popular  agitator.  And  then  the 
latter  half  of  his  life,  so  abruptly  divided  from  the 
former ;  his  strange  association  with  the  Countess 
Hatzfeldt ;  his  short  course  of  mad  popularity,  cul- 


52  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

minating  in  his  triumphal  progress  through  the 
South  German  States  in  the  summer  of  1864,  closing 
forever  at  the  end  of  that  same  summer  in  an  igno- 
minious  death  got  in  a  duel  arising  out  of  an  unedi- 
fying  love  affair,  in  which  his  enormous  vanity  de- 
veloped unsuspected  littlenesses — all  united  with  his 
brighter  student  experience  to  make  up  a  career  in 
which  was  curiously  exhibited  the  union  of  mental 
power  with  the  frailties  and  excesses  of  that  very 
human  nature  upon  whose  sturdiness  and  self-con- 
trol his  ideal  political  system  must  above  all  base 
itself/ 

Lassalle  takes  up,  first  of  all^Ricardo's  law,  that 
wages  can  not-J^je^^-ermanentlv  sustained  aT>ove  the 
cost  of  ^subsistence^  above  the  figure  which  will 
barely  enable  the  laborer  to  support  himself  and  to 
multiply  sufficiently  to  satisfy  the  demand  for  labor. 
He  calls  this  law  '^  Das  eherne  Lohngesetz,"  and 
maintaining  stoutly  its  uncompromising  application, 
he  demonstrates  from  it  the  utter  hopelessness  of 
the  situation  of  the  laborer  so  long  as  the  wage 
system  is  retained.  Upon  this  text  he  rings  the 
changes  with  insistent  repetition  and  ingenuity.  As 
the  wage  system  is  the  inevitable  result  of  produc- 
tion by  the  use  of  private  capital,  he  proposes  to 
remove  all  the  "  means  of  labor"  from  the  control 

^  He  adopted  as  ^a  motto  tlie  line  from  Virgil, 

"  Flectere  si  neqneo  Superos,  Acheronta  movebo." 


THE  SOCIALIST  STATE.  53 

of  private  individuals  and  to  make  them  a  common 
possession.     "  Capitalism"  ("  private  capital,"  "  cap- 
italistic  production")  has   liad   its   day,  and  must 
give  way  to  community  of  production.     Under  tlie 
expression  "  means  of  labor"  seem  to  be  included  all 
the  instruments  of  production  with  the  capital  neces- 
sary to  employ  them,  and  these  are  to  be  the  prop- 
erty of  the  community.     The  individual  is  to  have 
private  property  in  his  direct  earnings  only.     There 
is  no  time  here  to  give  an  adequate  description  in 
detail  of  the  socialistic  state.     All  contingencies  are 
provided  for  with  a  painful  particularity  that  would 
fill  volumes.     And  one  who  has  made  himself  at  all 
acquainted  with  the  logically  constructed,  intricate 
edifice  of  Rodbertus,  Marx,  and  Lassalle,  however 
he  may  disagree  with  their   fundamental    assump- 
tions, will  feel  that  any  attempt  at  partial  represen- 
tation would  necessarily  be  unfair.     Suffice  it  to  say 
that  their  scheme  contemplates  the  assumption  by 
the  State  of  the  control  of  a  network  of  industries, 
embracing  almost  all  the  activities  of  life,  whose  in- 
tricate vastness  appals  the  imagination.     All  prod- 
ucts would  be  stored  in  public  storehouses ;  all  labor 
would  be  paid  in  certificates  issued  upon  a  principle, 
propounded  by  Marx,  of  the  measure  of  value  by 
the  "social  working  time"  (gesellschaftliche  Arbeits- 
zeit).    These  certificates  would  be  exchangeable  for 
commodities.     Rent,  interest    on  money,  profits  of 


54  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

trade,  all  opportunities  of  personal  enrichment,  would 
be  forever  put  away.  By  the  perfect  system  of  su- 
pervision to  be  introduced,  by  the  mutual,  harmoni- 
ous relations  of  all  industries  and  occupations, 
working  toward  the  same  end,  freed  from  the  dis- 
turbing influence  of  competition,  production  would 
be  adjusted  with  approximate  accuracy  to  the  wants 
of  consumption,  and  thus  phenomena  of  over-pro- 
duction, followed  by  periods  of  distress,  whose  pain- 
ful consequences  fall  with  such  terrible  weight  upon 
the  lower  classes,  would  be  unknown.  Of  the  indi- 
rect benefits  which  are  to  result  by  reason  of  the  re- 
moval of  the  causes  of  many  of  the  vices  which  now 
afflict  society,  the  Socialist  draws  an  eloquent  pic- 
ture. It  should  be  said,  too,  that  the  Socialists  main- 
tain that  their  scheme  would  not  be  inconsistent 
with  privacy  in  living  and  the  sanctity  of  the  fam- 
ily ;  indeed,  that  it  would  not  abolish  private  prop- 
erty, inasmuch  as  each  would  have  full  freedom  in 
disposing  of  his  own  earnings.  It  is  the  retention 
of  this  faded  specter  of  private  property  which  jus- 
tifies them,  they  think,  in  denying  that  their  scheme 
is  communistic. 

The  carefully  elaborated  details  of  the  ultimate 
dream  of  Socialism  have  no  great  practical  import- 
ance, and  are  not  of  so  much  interest  to  the  present 
discussion  as  its  more  immediate  purposes  and  the 
steps  proposed  in  order  to  realize  them. 


FIRST  STEPS.  55 

Lassalle,  a  follower  of  Hegel,  had  imbibed  to  tte 
full  from  his  master  his  ideas  of  the  function  of  the 
State  as  a  civilizer.  All  his  hopes,  all  his  schemes 
center  in  the  State.  Not  only  did  he  look  to  the 
State  as  the  future,  ideal  dispenser  of  all  that  is 
good,  but  he  expected  to  make  use  of  the  State, 
under  its  present  imperfect  construction,  to  initiate 
and  effect  the  proposed  transformation.  This  dei- 
fication of  the  State  is  the  quintessence  of  the 
Socialist's  political  aspirations.  It  is  the  proper, 
antithesis  of  the  old  uncompromising  laisser  f aire  J 
laisser  passer  doctrine,  which  regarded  the  State 
as  a  necessary  evil,  and  reduced  its  functions  to  a 
minimum. 

But  Lassalle  took  credit  to  himself  for  recog- 
nizing society  to  be  an  organism  of  gradual  growth, 
and  did  not  advise  a  sudden  revolution.  The 
metamorphosis  was  to  be  accomplished  by,  what 
seemed  to  him,  gradual,  wholesome  changes.  He 
believed  that  two  centuries  would  be  necessary 
for  the  complete  suppression  of  the  wage  system. 
The  mention  of  the  first  step  which  he  proposed 
in  his  series  of  easy  changes  may  provoke  a  smile. 
It  was  no  less  than  the  establishment  of  a  loan 
fund  by  the  German  Government,  to  supply  capi- 
tal to  co-operative  associations  of  workingmen  for 
purposes  of  production.  He  asked  for  an  initia- 
tory fand  of  100,000,000  thalers,  to  supply  400,000 


56  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

workingmen,  at  an  annual  interest  of  two  per 
cent.  It  may  be  said  here  that  Lassalle  discoun- 
tenanced the  formation  of  co-operative  associations  in 
the  manner  at  present  in  vogue,  by  lyrivate  enter- 
prise, for  much  the  same  reasons  which  led  him  to 
discourage  strikes.  He  thought  them  not  only  nec- 
essarily ineifectual,  but  absolutely  harmful,  wast- 
ing the  strength  of  the  workingmen,  deluding 
them  with  false  hopes,  turning  them  from  the  pur- 
suit of  proper  measures,  and  in  the  end  only 
welding  more  firmly  the  chains  of  "capitalistic 
despotism."  His  most  bitter  controversy  was 
with  Schultz-Delitsch,  the  eminent  German  phil- 
anthropist, so  distinguished  for  his  efforts  in  the 
cause  of  co-operative  production. 

Such  is  a  hasty  description  of  the  exotic  at- 
tempted to  be  transplanted  to  American  soil,  some 
understanding  of  whose  nature  and  growth  is  nec- 
essary to  an  intelligent  appreciation  of  the  labor 
legislation  demanded  by  our  working-classes.  It 
is  at  once  seen  the  political  object  in  view  is,  first, 
the  complete  democratization  of  the  State.  Num- 
/bers  must  rule,  irrespective  of  all  extraneous  in- 
fluences, whether  of  wealth  or  education.  The 
workingmen  outnumber  all  the  remaining  classes 
together,  and  by  virtue  of  this  advantage,  made 
available  through  universal  suffrage,  may  they 
hope  to  accomplish  the  overthrow  of  the  "  Nabobs 


OF  THE     ^ 

UNIVERSITY 

OF 


POLITICAL  PROGRAMME.  57 

of  Industry."  For,  witli  untiring  perseverance,  Social- 
ism fans,  in  the  workingman,  the  notion  that  cap- 
ital is  merely  an  oligarchic  despotism ;  that  the 
physical  laborer  is  the  true  producer,  and  fairly 
entitled  to  the  proceeds  of  his  labor,  of  which,  as 
it  is,  the  capitalist  doles  out  to  him  a  mere  pit- 
tance, the  fraction  of  his  right,  reserving  to  him- 
self the  lion's  share,  under  the  specious  pretexts 
called  profits,  insurance,  wages  of  superintendence, 
and  the  like.  The  laborers  are  the  "  disinherited 
classes,"  "die  expropriirte  Masse;"  while  the  cap- 
italists are  "die  wenigen  Expropriateurs." ' 

This  deep-settled  conviction  on  the  part  of  the 
laborer  that  he  is  the  only  member  of  society 
whose  right  to  existence  is  unquestionable,  gives 
rise  to  that  strong  class  pride  which  is  so  notice- 
able at  times,  and  which  often  has  such  a  strange 
self-contradictory  ring  in  it. 

Holding  in  view,  then,  the  attitude  of  the  labor- 
er's mind,  and  the  direction  of  the  socialistic  in- 
struction to  which  he  submits  himself,  we  shall  be 
better  prepared  to  inspect  the  following  Declara- 
ration  of  Principles,  published  by  the  Working- 
men's  Party  after  their  Convention  of  1876,  which 

^  "  Les  Travailleurs,  ceux  qui  produisent  tout  et  qui  ne  jouissent  de 
rien,  ceux  qui  souflfrent  de  la  misere  au  milieu  des  produits  accumules, 
fruits  de  leurs  labeurs  et  de  leurs  sueurs,  devront-ils  done  sans  cesse  etre 
en  butte  a  I'outrage  ?  "— Jowrwa?  Offlciel  de  la  Rep.  Fran.,  d  Paris,  March 
20,  1871. 


58  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

is  subjoined,  as  the  best  exposition  of  their  imme- 
diate purposes  that  can  be  offered : 

**  1.  Eight  hours,  for  the  present,^  as  a  normal  working- 
day,  and  legal  punishment  of  all  violators. 

"  2.  Sanitary  inspections  of  all  conditions  of  labor,  means 
of  subsistence  and  dwellings  included. 

"  3.  Establishment  of  bureaus  of  labor  statistics  in  all  the 
States,  as  well  as  by  the  national  government ;  the  officers  of 
these  bureaus  to  be  taken  from  the  ranks  of  the  labor  organ- 
izations and  elected  by  them. 

"  4.  Prohibition  of  the  use  of  prison  labor  by  private  em- 
ployers. 

"  5.  Prohibitory  laws  against  the  employment  of  children 
under  14  years  of  age  in  industrial  establishments. 

"  6.  Gratuitous  instruction  in  all  educational  institutions. 

"  7.  Strict  laws  making  employers  liable  for  all  accidents  to 
the  injury  of  their  employees. 

"  8.  Gratuitous  administration  of  justice  in  all  courts  of 
law. 

"  9.  Abolition  of  all  conspiracy  laws. 

"  10.  Railroads,  telegraphs,  and  all  means  of  transportation 
to  pass  into  the  hands  of,  and  to  be  operated  by,  the  govern- 
ment. 

'Ml.  All  industrial  enterprises  to  be  placed  under  the  con- 
trol of  the  government  as  fast  as  practicable,  and  operated 
by  free  co-operative  trades-unions  for  the  good  of  the 
whole  people." 

A  close  examination  of  this  programme  is  interest- 
ing as  giving  a  definite,  practical  idea  of  the  aspira- 

*  The  italics  are  my  own. 


NEWSPAPERS.  59 

tions  of  a  not  unimportant  part  of  our  working  pop- 
ulation. Joined  with  demands  the  reasonableness 
of  whose  nature,  if  not  extent,  will  hardly  be  ques- 
tioned, the  most  significant  Socialistic  measures  are 
flaunted,  culminating  appropriately  in  the  last 
(11th)  article.  The  immediate  activity  of  the  labor 
agitators  in  the  legislative  assemblies  of  the  various 
States  seems  to  be  brought  to  bear  upon  the  enact- 
ment of  eight-hour  laws  and  the  establishment  of 
labor  bureaus.  To  the  latter  the  Socialists  attach 
great  importance.  A  Bureau  of  Labor  Statistics 
has  existed  successfully  in  Massachusetts  since  1870, 
and  other  States  have  since  imitated  her  example.' 
The  results  of  these  official  investigations  into  the 
condition  of  the  laboring  classes,  showing  up,  as 
they  often  do,  the  most  pitiable  spectacle,  farnish 
an  excellent  lever  with  which  to  move  audiences  of 
workingmen.  The  professional  agitator  is  usually 
provided  with  a  complete  series  of  the  Annual  Re- 
ports of  the  Massachusetts  Bureau. 

The  newspaper  strength  of  the  party  of  So- 
cialism is  more  considerable  than  would  be  expected. 
Most  of  the  papers,  however,  are  German.  It  is 
worthy  of  notice  that  although  several  efforts  have 

^  A  bill  for  the  establishment  of  a  labor  bureau  in  Connecticut, 
■which  was  the  special  protege  of  the  Socialist  element  in  that  State, 
was  recently  defeated  by  a  large  majority  in  the  Assembly,  on  the 
score  of  economy. 


60  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

been  made  to  establish  an  English  organ  in  New 
York,  none  have  succeeded.  The  Labor  Standard 
published  in  that  city,  which  was  meant  to  be 
the  principal  English  ^exponent  of  the  party,  has 
separated  from  the  Socialists  proper,  and  now  de- 
votes its  energies  to  the  cause  of  trades-unions, 
vicious  appeals  to  the  masses,  and  the  most  indis- 
criminate and  scurrilous  abuse  of  wealth/  In  con- 
nection with  the  mention  of  these  newspapers,  it 
may  be  said  that  the  lack  of  party  discipline  ap- 
pears very  strongly  in  the  whole  movement.  Dis- 
agreements are  frequent,  and  there  is  a  constant 
jealousy  between  the  English-  and  German-speak- 
ing branches. 

The  Socialistic  Labor  Party  claims  to  have  polled 
seventy  thousand  votes  at  the  State  elections  in  the 

^  A  recent  correspondent  of  the  Berlin  Stoats-Socialist  counts  up  11 
German  Socialistic  newspapers  published  in  the  United  States,  7  dailies 
and  4  weeklies.  Of  these  the  leading  ones  are  :  Ar'beiter  Stimme 
(New  York),  Vorbote  (Chicago),  Arheiter  von  Ohio  (Cincinnati),  Iribune 
(Buffalo),  Vorwaerts  (Milwaukee),  Volksdimme  des  Westens  (St.  Louis). 

There  are  at  least  seven  English  organs  of  Socialism  in  the  United 
States,  as  follows  :  The  National  Socialist,  recently  started  in  Cincin- 
nati as  chief  English  organ  of  the  Socialistic  Labor  Party ;  The  Socialist 
(weekly,  Detroit) ;  The  Labor  Standard  (New  York),  which  may  be 
reckoned  in  this  connection;  The  American  Socialist  (Oneida),  The 
Voice  of  Labor  (St.  Louis),  Emancipator  (Cincinnati),  The  People  (Pitts- 
burg). 

In  addition  to  which  may  be  mentioned  a  Bohemian  paper  published 
in  New  York,  the  Delnicke  Listy  (daily  and  weekly),  and  a  Scandinavian 
weekly  published  in  Chicago,  Den  Nye  Tid. 


VOTING  FORGE.  61 

fall  of  1877.  Since  then,  if  events  in  San  Francisco, 
Oaklan^d,  Chicago,  and  other  cities  furnish  a  true 
index,  the  party  has  increased  rather  than  dimin- 
ished. Withal  the  party  does  not  become  more  im- 
posing when  it  is  approached  more  nearly.  A 
closer  acquaintance  with  its  men  and  its  parapher- 
nalia introduces  one  to  an  amount  of  ignorance  and 
shiftlessness  inconsistent  with  the  inspiration  of  rev- 
erence or  fear.  It  is  exposed  in  an  eminent  degree 
to  the  casualties  which  hasten  the  dissolution  of 
political  parties.  If  it  carried  with  it  the  fate  of 
Communism  in  America,  then  all  alarm  might  be 
easily  pacified.  But  there  is  in  fact  no  such  de- 
pendent connection,  and  the  voting  force  of  the 
party  can  not  be  taken  to  indicate  accurately  either 
the  strength  or  weakness  of  the  communistic  ele- 
ment in  our  midst.  On  the  one  hand,  its  voters 
are  for  the  most  part  ignorant  laborers,  and  the 
carefully  elaborated  systems  of  Marx  and  Las- 
salle  are  not  capable  of  full  and  intelligent  com- 
munication to  their  untrained  minds.  They  can 
not  appreciate  the  meaning  of  the  economical 
change  proposed.  To  them  "  the  emancipation  of 
the  working-classes"  is  simply  a  magic  formula 
which  is  to  transform,  in  some  way,  present  evil 
into  vaguely  represented  future  good.  It  is  impossi- 
sible  to  say  how  far  many  of  them  would  go  with 
their  present  leaders,  should  they  become  more  en- 


62  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

lightened  respecting  their  ultimate  destination.  On 
the  other  hand,  it  may  be  safely  asserted  that  all 
the  elements  in  our  society  favorable  to  the  spread 
of  Socialism  are  not  to  be  sought  among  the 
formal  connections  of  the  Socialistic  Labor  Party. 
Many  conscious  and  unconscious  contributors  to  the 
advancement  of  communistic  ideas  stand  in  no  direct 
relation  to  the  party.  And  while  Socialism  is  not 
coextensive  with  the  labor  question,  yet  it  is  inti- 
mately bound  up  with  it.  The  new  philosophy  of 
renovation  has  a  tolerably  definite  plan,  the  sum 
and  substance  of  which  is  the  placing  of  labor  upon 
a  footing  totally  different  from  that  which  it  now 
occupies.  It  takes  hold  of  the  awakening  political 
consciousness  of  the  workingman,  and  leads  it  in 
the  desired  direction. 

It  will  thus  be  readily  believed  that  the  question 
as  to  the  actual  strength  of  Socialism  in  America  can 
not  be  satisfactorily  answered.  It  is  sufficiently  diffi- 
cult to  gather  into  some  compact,  intelligible  form  the 
visionary  schemes  of  the  learned  radical  profession ; 
but  nothing  could  be  more  evasive  of  exact  meas- 
urement than  the  extent  to  which  the  dissatisfaction 
among  the  working-classes  is  leavened  with  the 
leaven  of  Socialism,  and  the  influence  generally  of 
ideas  which  are  communistic  in  their  essence  and 
in  their  legitimate  fruits.  Still  more  uncertain 
would  it  be  to  attempt   to  predict  the  probabili- 


DANGERS  PECULIAR   TO  AMERICA.  63 

ties  of j^  the  future.  The  data  necessary  to  be  taken 
into  consideration  in  making  such  an  estimate  are 
too  diverse  and  minute.  Innumerable  little,  seem- 
ingly unimportant  vanes  which  swing  and  point  in 
the  direction  of  Socialism  may  be  obeying  merely 
a  fitful  breeze,  or  indicating  the  approach  of  a 
strong,  growing  current. 

In  the  countries  of  the  Old  World,  where  social 
distinctions  are  closer  and  more  galling,  class  is  ar- 
rayed against  class,  proletariat  against  bourgeoisie. 
In  the  United  States  the  movement  works  more 
subtly  and  none  the  less  dangerously.  It  is  a  very 
thoughtless  confidence  that  points  with  self-congrat- 
ulatory finger  to  the  compact  strength  of  the  Sooial- 
DemoJcraten  in  Germany.'  The  more  democratic  ^ 
constitution  of  our  society  keeps  the  small  man 
more  actively  alive  to  his  political  possibilities, 
makes  him  more  impatient  of  the  guidance  of  supe- 
rior culture,  gives,  in  a  word,  greater  influence  to  ig- 
norance. Nothing  could  be  more  favorable  tcrtHe" 
designs  of  Socialism  than  the  widespread  and  ever- 


^  Tlie  Berlin  correspondent  of  the  London  limes  writes  (March  22d, 
1878):  "The  Socialists  in  1871  succeeded  in  collecting  120,000  votes 
and  returning  two  members  to  the  German  Parliament ;  in  1874,  34,000 
votes  and  nine  members.  In  1877  they  registered  497,000  votes,  deput- 
ing twelve  members  to  the  National  Legislature.  In  1877  the  total  of 
the  enfranchised  electors  in  the  German  Empire  amounted  to  8,943,000. 
Of  these,  5,557,700,  or  about  60  per  cent,  having  voted,  it  follows  that 
nearly  one  tenth  of  all  the  votes  given  were  Socialistic,  an  extraordi- 
nary result  for  a  movement  not  thirty  years  old." 


64  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

deepening  belief  in  the  supreme  justice,  the  unerr- 
ing efficacy,  of  the  method  of  counting  heads.  The 
prevalent  political  looseness  is  a  tribute  to  the  nu- 
merical God.  The  strength  of  the  politician  is  the 
strength  of  the  crowd.  The  growing  sense  of  the 
necessity  of  conciliating  the  workingman  at  the 
polls  is  the  strongest  testimony  to  his  political  im- 
portance. The  Eight-hour  Law  of  1868  was  a  sig- 
nificant exhibition  of  the  strength  of  the  laborer 
even  under  a  hasty,  imperfect  organization.  On  the 
whole,  it  is  to  be  feared  that  pernicious  labor  legis- 
lation has  many  more  chances  of  success  in  a  Wash- 
ington Congress  than  in  the  German  Parliament. 

Apart  from  the  immediate  evil  effects  of  a  pre- 
dominance of  popular  errors  in  legislation,  there  is 
cause  for  alarm  in  the  intangible  growth  of  disre- 
gard for  contractual  obligations,  and  in  the  increas- 
ing habit  of  looking  upon  the  man  of  leisure  who 
lives  upon  his  income  as  a  creature  whose  existence 
is  entirely  without  justification,  taking  its  extreme 
form  in  a  grotesquely  exaggerated  hatred  of  the 
bondholder.  Just  as,  likewise,  the  increasing  tend- 
ency to  look  to  the  state  for  help,  and  such  popular 
efforts  to  widen  the  sphere  of  government  as  the 
Granger  movement,  are  all  more  or  less  significant 
steps  in  the  general  direction  of  Socialistic  concep. 
tions. 

Fortunately  the  American  laborer  has  hitherto 


FUNDAMENTAL  ERRORS.  65 

shown  less  receptivity  for  the  specific  doctrines  of 
Marx  and  Lassalle  than  was  expected  of  him.  That 
he  will  remain  always  as  deaf  to  the  Socialist  sirens 
can  not  be  counted  upon. 

Are  there  any  practical  lessons  to  be  learned  of 
Socialism  ?  Men  of  undoubted  ability,  information, 
and  thorough  study  look  to  a  solution  of  present 
difiiculties  by  the  application  of  remedies  essentially 
Socialistic.  This  consideration  alone  should  induce 
us  to  approach  the  subject  in  the  spirit  commended 
by  Mr.  Spencer,  "which  is  ever  ready  to  suspect 
that  the  convictions  we  entertain  are  not  wholly 
right,  and  the  adverse  convictions  are  not  wholly 
wrong."  Truth  is  the  outcome  of  the  conflict  of 
many  theories,  and  the  final  line  of  orderly  progress 
must  be  the  resultant  of  many  antagonistic  forces. 
Before  searching,  however  for  the  "soul  of  good- 
ness" which  may  be  supposed  to  dwell  also  in 
Socialism,  I  wish  to  point  out  briefly  some  funda- 
mental misconceptions  which  characterize  its  teach- 
ings. 

With  all  the  material  available  for  drawing  up  a 
heavy  indictment  against  society  in  its  present  form, 
there  is  still  so  much  of  exaggeration  in  the  Social- 
istic statement  of  the  case,  and  such  a  presentation 
of  only  one  side,  as  to  amount  to  virtual  untruth 
and  cause  a  distortion  of  judgment  to  which  the 
poor  man  is  especially  liable.    It  is  not  true  that  all 


66  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

those  wlio  have  wealth  are  wholly  given  over  to 
selfish  indulgence,  utterly  careless  of  their  less  for- 
tunate fellow-men,  secure  in  a  calm  "  unmarred  by 
sound  of  human  sorrow."  The  reign  of  selfishness 
is  not  all  the  Socialist  paints  it.  It  is  not  always 
overlooked  that  riches  bring  with  them  great  re- 
sponsibilities. Sympathy  and  beneficence  are  power- 
ful agents  in  alleviating  the  ills  of  life,  in  dulling 
the  sharp  inequalities  of  existence.  They  are  unceas- 
ingly watchful,  ingenious  in  devising,  constant  in 
devotion. 

It  is  not  true  that  the  State  does  leave,  or  ever 
has  left,  the  poor  man  improtected  to  the  mercy  of 
economic  laws.  The  alleviating  hand  of  the  State 
is  everywhere  seen  thrust  in  to  save  victims  from 
the  effects  of  their  own  excesses,  or  to  smooth  the 
path  of  untoward  circumstance.  Hospitals,  alms- 
houses, sanitary  regulations,  public  provision  for 
popular  entertainment,  all  mark  the  protecting  in- 
terference. 

f  It  is  not  true,  above  all,  that  every  human  unit  is 
entitled  merely  as  such  to  a  proportional  share  of 
the  good  things  of  life.  The  Socialist  makes  the 
problem  a  merely  mathematical  one  and  offers  a 
mathematical  solution. 

And  what  standard  is  there  by  which  a  quantum 
of  happiness  can  be  measured  out  ?  It  illustrates 
the  wide-reaching  complexity   of  the   subject  that 


DIFFICULTIES.  67 

the  theory  of  happiness  must  enter  so  deeply  into 
any  thorough  discussion  of  Socialism;  and  it  is  to  a 
total  omission  to  consider,  or  to  a  fallacious  concep- 
tion of,  this  very  theory  that  many  of  the  errors 
of  the  Socialist  philosophy  are  to  be  traced.  It  is  a 
great  misfortune  that  many  most  important  truths, 
by  dint  of  much  repetition,  should  acquire  a  con- 
temptible familiarity  and  be  carelessly  dismissed 
into  the  realm  of  truism,  where  they  lose  their 
proper,  effective  influence.  After  all,  are  not  the 
greatest  ills  of  life  common  ills,  from  which  wealth 
grants  no  exemption  ?  Does  not  each  new  opportu-  "7 
nity  add  the  possibility  of  a  new  disappointment,  and  \ 
the  more  refined  sensibility  learn  a  new  and  keener 
pang  in  sorrow  ?  The  Socialist  philosophers  meas-  ( 
ure  oif  the  happiness  of  class  against  class  with  rash 
confidence.  — ^ 

Or  who  shall  measure  desert ?  "A  chacun  selon 
ses  forces,  k  chacun  selon  ses  besoins,"  says  Cabet ; 
A  chacun  suivant  sa  capacite,  k  chaque  capacite  sui- 
vant  ses  oeuvres,"  says  Saint-Simon.  These  are  idle 
phrases.  Where  is  there  a  power  to  tell  us  which 
has  deserved  most  of  humanity :  a  Newton,  a 
Harvey,  or  a  Wilberforce  ?  Can  society  ever  repay 
Shakespeare,  Goethe,  and  Dante?  In  the  infinite, 
imperceptible  differences  of  individual  and  individ- 
ual, is  there  any  hope  for  the  maker  of  categories  ? 
But  Socialism,  with  all  its  assumption  and  sugges- 


68  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

tioii  of  untruth,  has,  first  o'  x,  this  good  effect :  it 
keeps  conscience  alive  and  intelligence  busy  about 
real  difficulties,  pushing  them  to  the  front  with 
ever-increasing  insistenc<^.  The  problem  of  a  labor 
population,  doing  the  hand-work  of  civilization, 
while  its  bounteous  results  lie  close  around  them  in 
tempting,  unattainable  proximity,  and  education 
steals  away  the  dull  bliss  of  ignorance,  must  be  the 
peculiar  Gordian  knot  of  an  age  whose  practice  is 
political  equality  and  whose  ideal  is  universal  en- 
lightenment. It  is  here  that  antiquity  becomes 
barren  of  instructive  examples.  The  ancients  could 
conceive  of  no  perfect  state  in  which  the  necessary, 
burdensome,  disagreeable,  physical  duties  of  life 
were  not  performed  by  slaves.  It  was  quite  in 
keeping  with  the  Greek  contempt  for  the  laboring 
classes  when  Plato  constituted  a  class  of  slaves  in 
his  republic,  and  assigned  to  all  artisans,  laborers, 
and  merchants  a  position  little  worthier,  excluding 
them  from  political  rights.  "The  manual  arts,"  says 
Aristotle,  "  are  base  and  unworthy  of  a  citizen.  The 
majority  of  them  deform  the  body.  They  make  it 
necessary  to  sit  in  the  shade  or  near  a  fire.  They 
leave  time  neither  for  the  republic  nor  for  one's 
friends." 

In  Rome  the  number  of  the  slave  population  rose 
steadily  as  the  simplicity  of  Roman  life  gave  way  to 


A  LABOR  POPULATION.  69 

the  multiplying  innU.  lions  of  progress;^  and  in 
Europe  throughout  the  middle  ages,  and  thereafter 
until  the  great  political  awakening,  the  '^manual 
arts"  were  performed  by  Classes  politically  subject. 
This  difference  of  itself  cieates  a  gap  between  aD- 
cient  and  modern  democracies  wide  enough  to  inter- 
fere with  hasty  inferences. 

Under  modern  conditions,  with  the  enormous 
multiplication  of  industries  to  correspond  with 
the  elaboration  and  multiplication  of  wants,  it  seems 
probable  that  the  number  of  those  who  are  engaged 
in  performing  the  baser  duties  of  life  must  continue 
to  bear  a  large,  perhaps  an  increasing,  proportion  to 
the  number  of  those  who  enjoy  extra  opportunities 
of  leisure  and  self-indulgence ;  while  the  tendency 
of  the  introduction  of  machinery  to  reduce  labor 
more  and  more  to  a  monotonous,  mechanical  task 
gives  some  apparent  foundation  to  the  alarm  lest, 
in  the  natural  course  of  events,  the  workman  may 
degenerate  into  an  eating,  sleeping  automaton  little 
better  than  the  machine  he  tends. 

With  regard  to  the  proportion  of  laborers,  nar- 
rowly socalled,  in  a  complex  society  where  occu- 
pations glide  one  into  another  through  indistin- 
guishable gradations,  it  is  impossible,  of  course,  to 
obtain  satisfactory  statistics,  any  thing  that  will 
give  more  than  a  general  notion  of  the  state  of  the 

'  Mommsen,  Rom.  Geschichte,  ii.,  81,  396,  and  iii.,  510,  511,  531. 


10  COMMUNISM  m  AMERICA. 

case.  It  will  be  evident  that  accurate  statistics 
giving  the  distribution  of  wealth  are  still  less  avail- 
able. Leone  Levi,  in  1867,  estimated  the  working- 
classes  of  England  at  twenty-two  millions,  earning 
yearly  £85  per  family,  and  the  middle  and  higher 
classes  at  eight  millions,  earning  j£193  per  family.' 

With  regard  to  the  United  States  I  have  been 
unable  to  find  even  approximate  figures;  and  it 
should  be  borne  in  mind  that  the  widely  different 
condition  of  land  ownership  in  the  two  countries 
must  largely  modify  any  reasoning  from  English  to 
American  circumstances.  But  Prof  Wagner  has 
certified  that  in  Germany,  where  there  is  still  a 
sturdy  peasant  class  of  allodial  proprietors,  the 
same  tendencies  as  in  England  are  to  be  clearly 
traced ;  tendencies  which  he  is  inclined  to  explain 
by  a  reference  to  the  rapid  growth  of  large  private 
individual  and  corporate  enterprises.  The  indus- 
trial conditions  in  the  United  States  being  essenti- 
ally the  same  with  those  of  the  highest-developed 

'  Leone  Levi,  Wages  and  Earnings  of  the  Working  Classes.  Lon- 
don, 1867. 

According  to  another  calculation,  taken  from  the  results  of  the  Eng- 
lish income  tax  and  combined  with  the  labors  of  Baxter  and  Rodbertus, 
there  were  in  1867  in  England  8500  persons  enjoying  each  an  income  of 
over  £5000.  These  8500  made  up  .062  per  cent  of  the  total  self-support- 
ing population,  their  total  income  being  15.4  per  cent  of  the  total  valued 
income  of  the  United  Kingdom  ;  while  (taking  an  estimate  of  an  oppo- 
nent of  Socialism)  4,519,000  self-supporting  persons  had  an  income  of 
less  than  £30.— Prof.  Ad.  Wagner,  in  the  Staats-Socialist,  Feb.  3,  1878. 


EMIGRATION  AND  CO-OPERATION  71 

modern  countries,  and  in  view  of  facts  patent  to  the 
observation  of  all,  it  can  hardly  be  asserted  that  we 
enjoy  any  peculiar  dispensation  from  this  same 
movement,  defining  more  and  more  sharply  the  con- 
trast between  wealth  and  poverty.  Every  year 
makes  dimmer  with  us  the  peculiar  conditions 
which  render  a  new  country  less  exposed  to  the 
evils  attendant  upon  a  thickly  settled  population. 

Emigration  suggests  itself  as  one  mode  of  relief, 
and  in  this  direction  we  certainly  possess  unusual 
advantages.  But  emigration,  while  always  an  ex- 
ceedingly valuable  safety-valve  deserving  of  the 
most  careful  attention  on  the  part  of  the  economist 
and  statesman,  is  but  a  temporary  makeshift,  and 
does  not  contribute  much,  even  temporarily,  toward 
the  solution  of  the  real  labor  question.  It  may 
draw  off  the  surplus  population  and  give  some 
relief  at  times  of  great  pressure,  but  the  relief  is  in 
a  sense  only  a  surface  one.  The  same  difficulties 
are  left  behind ;  the  same  industrial  methods,  the 
same  division  into  employers  and  employed,  capital- 
ists and  laborers;  the  same  social  inequalities. 

One  remedy  for  this  encroaching  dualism  seems 
indeed  to  be  less  applicable  in  America  than  in 
the  countries  of  the  Old  World.  The  dream  of  co- 
operative production  and  industrial  partnership 
dawned  upon  anxious  students  and  philanthropists 
with  all  the  hope  of  a  long-waited-for  inspiration, 


72  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

promising  in  the  fullness  of  time  to  accomplish 
wonders  toward  dispersing  the  shadows  which 
hang  over  modern  progress.  The  example  of  Mr. 
Briggs,  proprietor  of  the  Methley  Collieries,  and  of 
M.  LeClaire,  house-decorator  in  Paris,  seemed  about 
to  become  models  for  a  most  desirable  transforma- 
tion in  the  methods  of  industry.  But  already  faith 
in  this  supreme  remedy  is  faltering.  After  the 
first  activity  in  the  formation  of  co-operative  associa- 
tions, followed  a  corresponding  lull  which  does  not 
seem  to  be  often  broken.  Such  associations,  too, 
where  they  have  existed  successfully  have  discov- 
ered an  irresistible  tendency  in  almost  all  cases  to 
degenerate  into  joint-stock  companies  employing 
their  labor,  thus  leaving  the  kernel  of  the  labor 
question  untouched.  The  familiar  example  of  the 
Rochdale  Pioneers  is  an  interesting  case  in  point. 
The  story  of  those  sturdy  workingmen  has  been 
told  again  and  again,  and  its  recital  will  never  cease 
to  be  full  of  stirring  encouragement  and  instruction. 
But  they  have  now  become  virtually  a  joint-stock 
company.  Mr.  Thornton  laments  that  they  have 
fallen  away  from  the  principles  of  their  foundation. 
They  are  brilliant  examples  of  workingmen  who 
have  raised  themselves  out  of  their  class  :  they  have 
not  raised  their  class.  An  English  economist,  visit- 
ing Bochdale  after  an  absence  of  a  number  of  years, 
has  described  with  some  bitterness  the  sons  of  the 


THE  TRUE  PROBLEM.  73 

Pioneers  living  in  luxury  and  imitating  the  airs  and 
fashions  of  tlie  wealthy  of  all  times. '  This  is  why 
the  Socialist  leaders  drill  their  followers  into  un- 
flinching opposition  to  all  co-operation  which  is  not 
at  once  thorough,  sweeping,  and  directed  by  the 
State  itself.  It  is  easy  to  understand  why  Lassalle 
should  say  of  all  private  co-operative  attempts  that 
they  tended  to  create  a  "  fifth  estate." 

If,  then,  the  existence  of  a  large  working-class  is 
an  inevitable  fact,  from  which  no  theory  save  that 
of  the  Socialist  proposes  an  escape,  and  if  at  the 
same  time  the  political  equalization  of  all  classes 
calls  for  the  universal  diffusion  of  education,  the 
difficulty  is  reduced  to  the  question.  How  shall  the 
condition  of  labor  be  so  ordered  that  its  burdens 
may  be  consistent  with  at  least  a  moderate  degree 
of  intellectual  enlightenment  ?  The  most  sanguine 
optimism  can  hardly  look  for  any  immediate  satis- 

^  "  In  spite  of  these  marked  advantages,  however,  we  have  to  note 
that  co-operation  in  mechanical  industry  has  achieved  a  very  slight  and 
even  doubtful  success." — Prof.  Walker,  The  Wages  Question,  272. 

"Co-operation  in  this  country  has  hitherto  been  seldom  applied  to  the 
production  of  wealth.  Probably  at  least  nine  tenths  of  the  existing  co- 
operative societies  carry  on  those  ordinary  retail  businesses,  the  function 
of  which  is  to  distribute  rather  than  produce  wealth.  These  distrib- 
utive societies,  which  are  now  generally  known  as  co-operative  stores, 
are  wanting  in  the  most  essential  characteristics  of  co-operation,  for  they 
do  not  necessarily  establish  a  union — or  as  it  has  been  described,  a  mar- 
gin of  capital  and  labor." — Prof.  Fawcett,  "Position  and  Prospects  of 
Co-operation,"  Fortnightly  Review,  Feb.  1,  1874. 


74  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

factory  answer.  Many  thoughtful  observers  view 
the  situation  with  little  hope,  and,  while  they  reject 
the  solution  of  the  Socialist,  see  no  promise  of  sub- 
stantial improvement  under  the  present  methods. 

Under  these  circumstances  a  heavy  duty  falls 
upon  those  who  make  a  special  study  of  social  and 
economic  conditions.  And  among  the  effects  of  the 
ascitation  of  the  workino^-classes  under  the  leader- 
ship  of  Socialism,  this  one  is  perhaps  most  no- 
ticeable :  that  it  provokes  a  continual  proving  and 
remodeling  of  the  results  of  politico-economic  and 
social  science.  The  general  movement  at  the  head  of 
which  are  the  Kotheder-Socialisten  marks  the  influ- 
ence. It  is  necessary  to  mention  only  such  names 
as  Cliffe  Leslie  and  Thornton  in  England,  Laveleye 
in  Belgium,  Leroy-Beaulieu  in  France,  and  Wagner, 
Schmoller,  and  Schaffle  in  Germany,  to  sufficiently 
designate  the  movement.  The  old  school  of  politi- 
cal economy,  undei*  the  leadership  of  Adam  Smith, 
E-icardo,  and  J.  B.  Sa}',  clung  too  closely,  say  these 
new  men,  to  abstract  principles  and  natural  econo- 
mic laws.  They  trusted  too  implicitly  to  the  de- 
ductive method.  The  inductive  method  must  be 
more  thoroughly  introduced  into  this  as  into  the 
other  sciences ;  more  attention  must  be  given  to 
statistical  and  historical  investigation.  The  psycho- 
logical dependence  of  all  economic  phenomena  must 
be  continually  kept  in  mind,  and  the  impossibility 


THE  KATHEDEB-80CIALI8T8.  75 

of  deducing  rigid, scientific  laws  from  the  uncertain,, 
variable  qualities  of  human  nature  must  be  recog-1 
nized. 

Marx  starts  with  the  law  of  Adam  Smith  that  all 
wealth  is  the  result  of  labor,  and  leads  the  mind 
from  this  dogma  with  faultless  logic  to  the  condem- 
nation of  private  property. '  Lassalle  demonstrates 
the  hopelessness  of  the  prospect  for  labor,  from 
Malthus  and  Ricardo.  But  the  economists  of  the 
new  school  shake  off  the  burden  of  defending  old 
dogmas ;  and  Laveleye,  for  example,  denies  the  uni- 
versal and  uncompromising  application  of  '^das 
eherne  Lohngesetz,"  as  announced  by  Lassalle.  He 
maintains  that  increased  well-being  among  the 
working-classes  does  not  lead  inevitably  to  an  in- 
crease in  the  size  of  families. 

"  En  eff et,"  he  says,  "  la  France  est,  avec  la  Suisse 
et  la  Norwege,  le  pays  ou  la  propriete  se  trouve 
entre  le  plus  grand  nombre  de  mains,  et  ou  le  bien- 
etre  est  le  plus  egalement  reparti,  et  c'est  aussi  le 
pays  oil  la  population  s'accroit  le  plus  lentement. 
Depuis  vingt    ans,    malgre    d'eifroyables   crises,  la 

^  Marx  borrowed  this,  as  most  of  his  system,  from  Rodbertus,  who 
called  his  theory  "  eine  consequente  Durchfuhrung  des  von  Smith  in 
die  Wissenschaft  eingefiihrten  und  von  der  Ricardo'schen  Schule  noch 
tiefer  begriindeten  Satzes,  dass  alle  Giiter  wirthschaftlich  nur  als  Pro- 
duct der  Arbeit  anzusehen  sind,  nichts  als  Arbeit  kosten." — R.  Meyer, 
Emancipationskampf  des  vierten  Standes,  i.,  44. 


76  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

richesse  y  a  augmentee  plus  que  partout  ailleurs,  et 
la  population  est  restee  presque  stationnaire." ' 

The  influence  of  tlie  Katheder-Socialists,  whose 
activity  is,  in  a  sense,  due  to  the  irritant  Socialism, 
appears  especially  in  the  struggle  which  they  have 
entered  upon  with  the  old,  strict  laisser-faire  con- 
ception of  the  proper  functions  of  government. 
While  the  Manchester  men  maintain  that  the  inter- 
ference of  the  State  has  been  already  carried  too  far, 
that  the  happiness  of  all  will  be  best  served  in  the 
end  by  allowing  the  individual  the  utmost  possible 
freedom  in  the  pursuit  of  his  own  hapj)iness,  these 
new  economists,  on  the  other  hand,  assert  that  the  pos- 
sibilities of  the  State  as  a  directing,  moderating  influ- 
ence have  not  been  sufficiently  recognized,  and  that 
the  use  of  the  governmental  power  to  curb  excesses 
of  private  competition  and  to  put  some  limit  to  pri- 
vate  accumulation  of  wealth  would  remove  many 

^  Remie  des  Deux  Mondes,  Dec.  15,  1876,  p.  882.  In  support  of 
Laveleye's  assertion  another  authority  may  be  quoted  here.  According 
to  a  Report  of  the  French  Bureau  of  General  Statistics  (cited  in  Journal 
of  the  Statistical  Society,  London,  vol.  xxxvii.,  540),  the  average  wages  of 
laborers  in  France,  exclusive  of  Paris,  amounted  in  1853  to  96  centimes 
a  day ;  this  had  risen  in  18^1  to  1  franc  40  centimes,  an  increase  of 
somewhat  more  than  45  per  cent ;  and  as  during  the  same  eighteen 
years,  it  was  estimated,  the  cost  of  necessaries  rose  about  33  per  cent,  the 
result  would  indicate  a  considerable  rise  in  real  icages. 

"  Quand  Arthur  Young  voyait  en  France  le  sol  divise  en  un  tres- 
grand  nombre  de  mains,  il  predisait  que  le  pays  se  transformerait  en  une 
garenne  de  Japins:  c'est  tout  le  contraire,  qui  a  eu  lieu." — Revue  des 
Deux  Mondes,  ib.,  882. 


INDIRECT,  BENEFICIAL  RESULTS.  77 

causes  of  danger  by  alleviating  the  present  great 
social  inequalities.  They  would  hardly  indeed  go 
to  the  length  of  any  thing  approaching  the  Socialist 
claim  that  capital  loan  funds  should  be  established 
by  the  State.  The  experience  of  the  government 
of  '48  has  warned  all  imitators  from  that  ground.' 
There  is,  it  may  be  supposed,  some  happy  point  of 
balance  between  the  two  extremes  of  ^'  administra- 
tive nihilism"  and  production  under  governmental 
direction.  Around  this  point  the  contest  is  pro- 
gressing. 

This  will  be  perhaps  sufficient  to  suggest  the  gen- 
eral character  of  that  movement  in  the  field  of 
politico-economic  science,  whose  existence  indicates 

^  The  Constituent  Assembly  (France)  voted  in  July,  1848,  to  appropri- 
ate tliree  million  francs  to  lend  to  workingmen  who  wished  to  form 
productive  associations.  Sixty-one  such  associations  were  formed  ;  ten 
years  later  there  were  but  nine  of  them  left  altogether,  only  four  of 
which  could  be  said  in  any  sense  to  be  prospering. — See  Villetart, 
Histoire  de  V Ldernationale,  26. 

Even  private  attempts  in  the  same  direction  proved  equally  disastrous. 
The  "  Societe  du  Credit  au  Travail,"  formed  by  M.  Beluze  in  1863  at 
Paris,  perished  before  1870,  similarly  with  the  celebrated  effort  of  the 
emperor  to  establish  a  "  Caisse  des  Associations  Cooperatives." — Ibid., 
cli.  ii.,  sec.  4. 

All  observers  have  remarked  that  outside  aid,  whether  from  the  State 
or  from  philanthropic  individuals,  has  always  exerted  a  rapidly  demoral- 
izing effect  upon  attempts  at  co-operative  production. 

Of  the  co-operative  associations  above  referred  to,  established  on  the 
credit  voted  by  the  Assembly  in  1848,  Laveleye  has  stated  that  only 
one  remained  in  1875  {''Tsi\\\GVimAQ\ime^").—ltevue  des  Deux  Mondes, 
ub.  sup.,  890. 


78  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

the  one  great  good  which  has  come  out  of  Socialism. 
This  good  is  seen  in  the  unexampled  activity  with 
which  the  study  of  social  conditions  has  been  pros- 
ecuted during  the  past  twenty-five  years.  Before 
that,  it  seemed  that  the  science  of  political  economy 
would  settle  down  with  unprogressive  complacency 
to  the  contemplation  of  its  accomplished  labors. 
Now  it  is  recognized  that  students  of  social  phenom- 
ena must  not  be  content  to  formulate  difficulties 
logically  and  accurately  ;  they  must  be  ever  eagerly 
seeking  remedies  and  improved  methods.  This 
activity  is  itself  the  safest  promise  of  future  ameli- 
oration. 

Recent  investigations  lead  to  the  belief  that  in 
primitive  times  property  was  held  in  common  and 
not  in  severalty.  It  would  be  indeed  strange  if 
events  were  tending,  as  many  assert,  to  a  return  to 
a  state  of  things  characteristic  of  a  cruder  period. 
Such  a  return  is  difficult  to  conceive  of.  To  one 
who  looks  upon  the  advance  of  the  whole  as  a  con- 
stant process  of  differentiation,  due  to  the  several 
struggles  of  individuals,  the  adoption  of  any  system 
whose  inevitable  principle  would  be  the  weighting 
of  the  swift  to  accommodate  the  slow  must  seem  in 
the  highest  degree  improbable.  But  it  is  character- 
istic of  the  Socialist  that  he  is  blind  to  prosaic 
facts.  When  actualities  are  repulsive  to  his  theory, 
he  ignores   them.     He   feeds   upon   exaggerations. 


VISIONARY  OPTIMISM.  79 

He  makes  bold  offers  to  cure  witli  his  patent  reme- 
dies the  ills  which  beset  the  social  body.  To  offset 
these  the  sober  student  ventures  but  modest  prom- 
ises. The  one  seems  to  preach  only  patience,  while 
the  other  preaches  emancipation.  But  if,  bowing 
before  the  invincible  destroyers  Disease  and  Death, 
we  study  human  nature  in  its  weakness  and  degra- 
dation as  well  as  in  its  beauty  and  strength,  not 
forgetting  its  enthusiasm,  its  poetry,  its  self-devo- 
tion, but  remembering,  too,  its  every-day  vices,  its 
sordid  aims,  its  petty  passions,  its  impotence  in  the 
midst  of  its  greatest  conquests ;  if  we  see  in  the 
history  of  institutions  a  record  of  imperfect  devices 
hammered  out  as  well  as  may  be  through  centuries 
of  hard  experience — then  we  shall  cherish  no  san- 
guine visions  of  the  final  perfection  of  human  soci- 
ety, we  shall  resign  with  less  regret  the  millennial 
reign  of  peace,  plenty,  and  universal  happiness  which 
is  so  confidently  promised  by  these  would-be  re- 
formers with  their  self-satisfied  wisdom  and  cheap 
nostrums.  Then,  too,  we  shall  be  in  a  position  to 
maintain  that,  considering  the  unmeasured  slowness 
of  all  growth,  it  can  not  with  truth  be  asserted  that 
the  institution  of  private  property  has  yet  developed 
to  the  utmost  its  capacity  to  cope  with  the  difficul- 
ties of  social  existence.  Integral  improvement  must 
be  the  sum  of  infinitesimal  individual  efforts,  and 
what  abundant  opportunities  exist  in  the   life   of 


80  C0MMUNI8M  IN  AMERICA. 

each  citizen  to  increase  Ms  own  contribution  to  the 
general  advance  ! 

To  this  end  there  will  be  necessary  a  wider-spread, 
more  intelligent  sense  of  personal  responsibility, 
issuing  in  practical  doing,  affecting  all  the  personal 
relations  of  life,  establishing  more  kindly  sympathy 
between  employer  and  employed,  introducing  gen- 
erosity and  liberal-mindedness  into  the  management 
of  great  enterprises,  giving,  in  a  word,  to  education 
more  effective  moral  influence.  And  while  so  much 
faith  is  put  in  as  ort  of  half-education  of  the  work- 
ing masses  which  in  many  cases  raises  them  no 
higher  than  discontent,  is  there  not  great  room  for 
hope  that  a  wider,  better-directed  education  of  those 
who  already  call  themselves  the  educated  classes 
may  do  much  to  increase  the  general  sense  of  the 
responsibilities  of  existence,  and  thus  weaken  the 
power  of  that  selfishness  whose  grievous  results  are 
undeniable  ? 

Meanwhile  voices  come  to  us  with  warnings  that 
democracies  are  peculiarly  exposed  to  the  dangers 
arising  out  of  inequality  of  social  conditions.  The 
stories  of  the  democracies  of  the  past  are  told  at 
length  in   order   to  point  the  moral/      But   there 

^  "  In  the  autlior's  opinion,  modern  democracies  will  only  escape  the 
destiny  of  ancient  democracies  by  adopting  laws  such  as  shall  secure  the 
distribution  of  property  among  a  large  number  of  holders,  and  shall  es- 
tablish a  very  general  equality  of  conditions." — Layeleye,  Primitive 
Property,  xxxiii. 


AMERICAN  CIRCUMSTANCES.  81 

are  considerations  which  would  strengthen  Ameri- 
cans in  the  belief  that  they  have  less  to  fear  than 
the  countries  of  the  Old  World  from  immediate  Com- 
munistic efforts,  whether  of  the  revolutionary  or  of 
the  insidious  orderly  type.  Any  one  who  comes  into 
personal  contact  with  this  ultra-radical  movement 
will  hardly  fail  to  be  impressed  with  the  fact  that 
there  is  no  better  cure  for  radical  leanings  in  the 
individual  than  a  little  worldly  success.  The 
more  able,  active  spirits  among  the  Communists, 
those  who  constitute  the  class  of  men  under  whose 
leadership  alone  Communism  could  ever  be  danger- 
ous, are  being  continually  won  from  the  cause  by 
the  acquisition  of  property  and  social  standing.  It 
is  indeed  more  fitting  that  the  merely  physical 
duties  of  society  should  be  performed  by  those  who 
are  intellectually  less  capable.  And  in  the  presence 
of  the  difficulties  arising  out  of  social  inequality,  it 
is  the  great  advantage  which  democracies  possess 
over  more  aristocratic  forms  that  they  oifer  superior 
facilities  for  a  constant  sifting  process,  allowing  the 
less  energetic  to  sink,  the  more  energetic  to  rise  to 

"  We  should  not  forget  this  important  lesson  taught  us  by  the  history 
of  political  and  social  institutions.  Democracies  which  fail  to  preserve 
equality  of  conditions,  and  in  which  two  hostile  classes,  the  rich  and  the 
poor,  find  themselves  face  to  face,  are  doomed  to  anarchy  and  subse- 
quent despotism.  The  recent  strikes  in  the  United  States  show  that  the 
danger  there  is  already  near  the  surface." — Ihid.,  xliii. 
6 


82  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

the  top.  It  will  be  well,  then,  to  bear  this  continu- 
ally  in  mind:  the  more  complete  the  absence  of 
class  barriers,  the  freer  and  more  thorough  and  con- 
stant the  interchange  between  class  and  class,  the 
easier  the  exit  of  excellence  from  outgrown  material 
surroundings,  the  more  sure  will  be  the  average 
progress,  and  the  less  opportunity  will  there  be  of 
the  Communist  disaffection  becoming  wide-spread, 
deep-seated,  and  powerful. 

An  attempt  has  thus  been  made  to  suggest  the 
general  features  of  a  subject  whose  thorough  treat- 
ment would  require  much  wider  limits  than  those  of 
the  present  essay.  I  shall  be  satisfied  if  I  have  suc- 
ceeded in  giving  a  true  impression  of  its  importance. 
An  examination  of  the  evidences  of  Communistic 
tendencies  in  America  has  led  me  to  the  conclusion 
that  all  such  tendencies  of  sufficient  importance  to 
merit  serious  consideration  are  to  be  associated 
with  the  new  Socialism. 

I  have,  then,  endeavored  to  suggest  the  circum- 
stances of  the  birth  of  Socialism,  to  trace  briefly  its 
rise  in  America,  to  describe  its  political  mechanism, 
and  to  give  some  notion  of  its  political  strength.  I 
have  endeavored  to  convey  a  dispassionate  idea  of 
its  spirit  and  purposes,  with  a  general  outline  of  the 
political  system  which  it  aims  to  establish.  While 
pointing  out   some   of    the   misconceptions    which 


CONCLUSION.  83 

underlie  the  Socialist  philosophy,  I  have  endeav- 
ored to  elicit  the  practical  lessons  which  are  to  be 
learned  of  the  movement.  I  have  attempted  to 
show  that  it  throws  up  a  true  difficulty,  one  which 
will  face  us  as  it  faces  Europe,  as  it  must  face 
every  free,  enlightened,  thickly  settled  country. 

It  may  not  be  out  of  place  to  add  one  word,  in 
conclusion,  with  reference  generally  to  the  temper 
of  Socialism.  There  is  an  undefined  feeling,  char- 
acteristic of  our  age — characteristic  more  particular- 
ly, perhaps,  of  our  own  people — which  I  can  not  bet- 
ter designate  than  by  calling  it  impatience  of  the 
slowness  of  growih.  Advances  in  physical  discov- 
ery, mechanical  invention,  and  material  comfort,  fol- 
lowing in  bewildering  succession,  have  a  tendency 
to  promote  the  rise  of  a  restless  eagerness  regarding 
the  future  of  the  race ;  to  cultivate  an  overweening 
confidence  in  man's  power ;  to  awaken  unfounded 
hopes  of  the  perfection  of  institutions  and  the  gen- 
eral diffusion  of  happiness.  It  is  right  to  expect  an 
increase  of  general  happiness  from  improvement  in 
social  methods.  But  it  is  lost  sight  of  that  the  con- 
dition of  the  social  body  is  more  intimately  and  de- 
pendently  related  with  man's  moral  nature  than 
with  his  intellectual  conquests  or  his  mere  material 
status.  Indeed,  moral  growth  on  the  one  hand  and 
material  growth  on  the  other,  so  far  from  proceeding 
pari  passu,  seem,  at  times,  to  be  in  direct  opposition. 


84  COMMUNISM  IN  AMERICA. 

There  has,  it  will  be  generally  admitted,  been  no 
moral  advance  to  correspond  with  tremendous  ma- 
terial strides.  The  failure  of  happiness,  then,  to 
meet  expectation  occasions  a  revolt,  and  this  revolt 
finds  an  expression  in  Socialism.  Keenly  aware  of 
the  presence  of  ills,  confident  of  their  own  power  to 
heal,  disregarding  the  delicacy  of  the  organism  with 
which  they  experiment,  the  Socialist  physicians  ap- 
proach with  easy  assurance,  nay,  with  criminal  reck- 
lessness, a  disease  which  it  is  the  life-task  of  the 
world  to  understand  and  cure.  In  order  to  create 
an  opportunity  for  the  application  of  their  boasted 
remedies,  they  dare  to  appeal  without  scruple  to  the 
disorganizing  forces  of  society.  But  let  him  who 
would  summon  spirits  beware  lest,  when  they  come, 
he  feel  no  power  to  govern  their  unforeseen  willfulness, 
and  can  find  no  magic  formula  to  send  them  back  to 
their  dark  hiding-place.  When  the  fiendish  antics  of 
his  strange  guests  fill  him  with  terror  and  threaten  him 
with  desolation,  the  ready-tongued  apprentice  may 
be  glad  to  call  upon  the  slow,  resistless,  organizing 
power  of  order,  the  power  which  builds  and  builds 
through  the  patient  ages,  careless  as  well  of  the  type 
as  of  the  single  life. 

THE    END. 


/  OF  THE     *^ 

^  UNIVERSITY 


INDEX 


PAGE 

Agitators 31 

Amana   10 

Aristotle 68 

Aurora 11 

Bethel 11 

Blanc,  Louis 24- 

Brisbane,  Albert 18 

Brook  Farm 19 

Cabet 14 

Campanella 17 

Channing   19 

Communes  in  America.  .9  et  seq. 

Commune,  refugees  of 24 

Communism,  different  uses  of 
word,  1  ;  how  related  to 
Socialism,  4,  6  ;  tendencies 

communistic  in  spirit 64 

Co-operation 72 

Curtis,  George  William 19 

Elkins,  Hervey 13 

Emigration 71 

Fourier 15,  17,  18,  19 

Fourth  Estate 22 

France,  influences  from. 21,  22,  23 

Fuller,  Margaret 19 

Germany,  influences  from.. 23, 

36,  49 

Greeley,  Horace 18 

Greek  conception  of  State 68 

Harmony 11 

Harrison,  Frederic 43,  44 

Hawthorne 19,  20 

Hernhuters 17 


PAGE 

Huss 17 

Icarians 14 

Industrial  Partnerships 71,  72 

International,  the 25,  26,  27 

Inspirationists * . .   10 

James  1 5 

Katheder-Socialists..74,  75,  76,  77 

Keil,  Dr 11 

Labor   Question — relation   to 

Communism 1,  2 

Labor  legislation 22 

Labor  population   69,  70 

Laisser  faire  76,  77 

Lanark  15,  16 

Lange,  Fried.  Albert 48 

Lassalle  24,  51,  52,  55,  56 

Laveleye,  Emile 75 

Lej^den 6 

Marx,  Karl 50 

Mill,  John  Stuart 18,  43 

Mohl,  Robert 43 

Morelly 17 

Mount  Lebanon 12 

National  Labor  Union 26 

New  Harmony 15 

New  Lanark 15 

Newspapers,  Socialist 59,  60 

Nordhoflf,  Charles 9 

Noyes 12,  15 

Owen,  Robert 15,  16 

Oneida 11,  12 

Panic  of  '73 28 

Paris,  Revolution  of  '71 3,  4 


86 


INDEX. 


PAGE 

Perfectionists 11,  13 

Phalanst^res   17 

Plato 17,  68 

Plymouth  Bay  Colony 6,  7,  8 

Proudhon 24 

Rapp,  George 11 

Ricardo 52 

Riots  of '77 29 

Rochdale  Pioneers 72 

Rome 68 

Shakers 9,  10,  11,  12,  13,  14 

Socialism — use  of  word,  1  ; 
its  complaint,  40-42 ;  its 
criticism  of  the  present  or- 
der, 44,  45  ;  its  logical  posi- 
tion,  46  ;  its  scientific  atti- 


PAGE 

tude,  47 ;  conception  of 
State,  53,  55 ;  difficulty  of 
estimating  its  strength,  61- 
63;  its  misconceptions,  65 
-67  ;  beneficial  effects,  68  ; 
influence  on  political  econ- 
omy    74 

Socialistic  Labor  Party 30,  31 

Social  Science 13 

Tompkins  Square 18 

Trades  Unions.  ...   23 

Tribune..    ..   18 

Virginia  Colony... ,   5,  6 

Wallingford   11.  12 

Workingmen's   Party  of   the 
U.  S 30,  31,  58,  59 


14  DAY  USE 

RETURN  TO  DESK  FROM  WHICH  BORROWED 

LOAN  DEPT. 

RENEWALS  ONLY— TEL  NO.  642^405 

This  book  is  due  on  the  last  date  stamped  below,  or 

on  the  date  to  which  renewed. 

Renewed  books  are  subject  to  immediate  recall. 

' 

T 

^^t^  mi^ 

^.-^ 

-  ■^^■mmg4 

OCT  2  6  1975  1  < 

) 

^H^CIR.    Jiwio'75 

i — 1 

1  1 

■K— 

t— 

t?/oii;^or.?6'!i.33      «-^SF-" 

APR    2  1931 


23 


^5^(^6S"9 


«>  ♦ 


